Wow, I think I have just experienced my first earthquake, in Madrid! Sitting on the sofa next to Marina, 9.45 ish, wishing I hadn’t had that last gin and tonic in some wonderful fiestas we stumbled across last night in Madrid’s La Latina barrio, and suddenly everything started shaking! The sofa was rumbling, the standard lamp was wobbling back and forth, Marina said, “Ben, stop doing that,” and I said “it’s not me! It’s a bloody earthqauke!!!” Wow.
Update: it was a 4.7 quake with the epicentre in Ciudad Real. News in Spanish
Hi Ben, it woke me up all the way down here in Murcia!
Matthew
12 Aug 07 at 10:03 am
Were there two? – that news source says: “Ha sido a las 9.30 de la mañana y ha durado menos de 10 segundos.”
greytop
12 Aug 07 at 10:33 am
Cancel that last question – false assumption
greytop
12 Aug 07 at 10:35 am
We had an earthquake in Holland about ten years ago and it woke me up too because my bed was shaking. I’d been through an earthquake in southern Mexico but I couldn’t believe this was actually happening in Holland, so all kinds of crazy thoughts raced through my mind! It was quite uncanny at first.
Edith
12 Aug 07 at 10:47 am
I assume "Ben, stop doing that,†is a translation!!
Jules
12 Aug 07 at 1:44 pm
They’ve updated that original (4.7) estimate, now they’re calling it a magnitude 5.1 — pretty big for Europe!
El Jardinero Zurdo
12 Aug 07 at 4:51 pm
@Jules, I knew that phrase might be open for misinterpretation!
Ben
12 Aug 07 at 9:42 pm
I’ve slept through three small tremors in Lima, so still yet to really experience anything – only a couple of months to go until earthquake season though.
Stuart
13 Aug 07 at 5:05 am
How often does Madrid or Spain, for that matter, get earthquakes? When was the last one previous to this? I’m glad it was minor.
ValenciaSon
13 Aug 07 at 12:09 pm
Very infrequelntly I believe , no idea when the last one was, but it could be decades back…
Ben
13 Aug 07 at 12:21 pm
I saw a comment in the the press today saying it is surprising that 2 earthquakes in the last few months in a region with no history of them doesn’t attract more attention. The other one was in Guadalajara province. Maybe the plates are shifting? The biggest earthquake that I know of in Iberia was that which destroyed Lisbon in 1755 – you can see how far that one reached, as Salamanca cathedral still bears some of the scars.
Graeme
13 Aug 07 at 7:09 pm
There was an earthquake in Murcia on the day I first arrived in the city in February 1999. It ‘destroyed’ quite a few houses in one of the nearby villages. Everybody was very nervous and it was the talk of the town for the rest of the week.
Matthew
14 Aug 07 at 10:43 am
There was one measuring 6.1 on the Richter scale back in February this year. True, the epicentre was off the south west Portuguese coast so no-one bore the full brunt of it, but it was felt through much of Andalucía – buildings were evacuated for Sevilla for example – and some said they felt it as far away as Madrid (source, El Mundo http://tinyurl.com/2occ8s)
rod
14 Aug 07 at 4:57 pm
@VS There are about 2500 a year but only 2 a month are noticeable. From Lasprovincias article. Most are around Southern & South-eastern Spain
http://www.lasprovincias.es/valencia/20070812/ocio/detectado-terremoto-grados-intensidad_200708121006.html
greytop
14 Aug 07 at 6:49 pm
Comment from Stuart
Time: August 13, 2007, 5:05 am
I’ve slept through three small tremors in Lima, so still yet to really experience anything – only a couple of months to go until earthquake season though.
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Whew! After last nights 8.0 quake in Peru your post seems eerily prescient. I hope you’re OK Stuart?
Margot
17 Aug 07 at 1:43 am
Hi Margot, I instantly thought of Stuart after hearing of the quake in Peru. Luckily, his newly updated blog http://enperu.blogsyte.com/ tells us he’s ok, and is also a good source of first-hand info about the quake.
Pepino
17 Aug 07 at 12:37 pm