Twitter and the Birmingham (ish) Earthquake.
I thought I was going mad – but only if Jon is too. We both know that twitter knows best and (thanks again jon) the Dutch are tracking the story for us.
Update 3 Jo Geary found this link – 4 earthquakes dotted arou nd the country – nearest is Nottingham. Beats phoning the police press line.
Update 4: Others experienced it in similar ways with confirmation coming through twitter of similar.
http://johnleach.co.uk/words/archives/2008/02/27/300/
- http://www.klmcpherson.com/archives/27/02/2008/earthquake/
- http://www.zarrblog.com/2008/earthquake-in-england/
- http://laugana.livejournal.com/11889.html
- http://www.albino-igil.com/blog/2008/02/27/i-believe-weve-just-had-an-earthquake-in-derby/
- http://www.democracypr.com/wp/?p=24
Should I laugh at “Well, either a fat bloke just fell out of bed or there has been a minor earth tremor in
Nottingham”? In Leeds Ross at Democracypr tells us: “And the BBC web site? A note on the ticker – “Reports of tremor felt in West Midlands. More details soon.”
No need to bother, I’ve found out all I need use my own network of citizen journalists.”
Update: 01.33 Lisa Dowd on Sky tells us that because she can’t get through to the police she can’t really tell what has happened and only new it was an earthquake because she felt it last time – the Dudley earthquake. Get social Lisa – we can tell you what’s going on.
Update: 01.35 Joanna has google map up with epicentre before sky know what’s what.
Your Famous! 
Love you lots .x.
February 27th, 2008 at 2:12 am
[...] I twittered first, but Nick beat me to the blog. Without twitter I’d have thought I was going mad, Nick confirmed it “podnosh mine too. 6M Ago” and: “orangejon wonders if he’s hallucinating or if there was really just an earthquake. Either that or the house is falling down… 5M Ago” [...]
February 27th, 2008 at 2:36 am
Leeds! Leeds!
Holmfirth mate. Close enough though I suppose!
RB
February 27th, 2008 at 2:37 am
Oh – and thanks for the trackback too!
February 27th, 2008 at 2:41 am
Sorry Ross. I like Leeds and Holmfirth (Holmfirth more of course)
February 27th, 2008 at 2:43 am
Aye – felt it here just south of Derby, the neighbour rushed round thinking the chimney was collapsing…the site of him at my window in the dead of night almost gave me a second potential heart attack of the evening.
February 27th, 2008 at 2:45 am
Hi Duncan – this is better than listening to news drivel
February 27th, 2008 at 3:36 am
If you followed my blog you\’d have had all of this info at about 01:10am
The Sun, in its traditionally restrained manner, has already written a comprehensive summary of the night\’s events. I won\’t spoilt it for you, but I strongly suggest you read it:
http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/article851350.ece
February 27th, 2008 at 3:51 am
I felt it too!
I live in Norwich. There was a small build up, at which point my bed began to shake. I jumped up and my feet could feel the ground vibrating. I could hear my door and the other doors in my house vibrating too.
I could definitely tell it was the ground shaking just by the sound of it all. I could hear a deep tremor deep under the ground.
Spooky stuff!
February 27th, 2008 at 10:27 am
I must remember to switch my Twitter alerts off when I go to bed. I got about 8 messages all through last night; the earthquake never woke me, but Twitter did…several times!
February 27th, 2008 at 10:33 am
Sorry Mark we\’ll whisper next time we t a quake. It spooked me L. I spent about 4 minutes wandering around the house for no good reason other than I couldn\’t believe the way the floor rippled. Brilliant job Christopher – I also like the sun headline about how viagra turned me blue.
February 27th, 2008 at 10:32 pm
The USGS had their automated systems online very quickly and since the quake over 10000 people have reported that they ‘felt it’ http://pasadena.wr.usgs.gov/shake/ous/STORE/X2008nyae/ciim_display.html
you can even download a table of it http://pasadena.wr.usgs.gov/shake/ous/STORE/X2008nyae/ciim_download.html – lots more here http://earthquake.usgs.gov/eqcenter/recenteqsww/Quakes/us2008nyae.php (and a much more lickely sounding 4.7 not 5.3) A marked difference to the British Geological Survey, their response, a PDF press release… (full disclosure, former volunteer with the USGS here, they know what they’re doing when it comes to earthquakes)
February 28th, 2008 at 12:58 am
[...] Lo sviluppo, di come la notizia è passata in rete è stata tracciata anche da Podnosh e da ReadWriteWeb, sottolineando il fatto che emittenti come BBC NEWS hanno riportato la notizia 35-40 minuti dopo il primo twitter. [...]
March 1st, 2008 at 12:02 pm
[...] An Italian blog recently referenced a twitterquake experience I shared with Jon Bounds and Joanna Geary (and before you reach for the irritating cliche yes the earth did move for all 3 of us – which is why we were blogging at 2am – partly to reassure each other that we were not mad and the earth had just moved). [...]