#RECENT EARTHQUAKES IN ANCHORAGE ALASKA DRIVER#

“People who were outside were actively hugging each other,” he said. But it is rare for a quake this big to strike so close to such a heavily populated area.ĭavid Harper was getting coffee at a store when the low rumble began and intensified into something that sounded “like the building was just going to fall apart.” He ran for the exit with other patrons. Southern Alaska has a high risk of earthquakes because the Earth’s plates slide past each other under the region.Īlaska has been hit by a number of powerful quakes over 7.0 in recent decades, including a 7.9 last January southeast of Kodiak Island. The state averages 40,000 earthquakes a year, with more large quakes than the 49 other states combined.

It and the tsunami it triggered claimed about 130 lives. The 9.2-magnitude quake on March 27, 1964, was centered about 75 miles (120 kilometers) east of Anchorage. Everything that’s not tied down is broke.”Īlaska was the site of the most powerful earthquake ever recorded in the U.S. “There’s no pictures left on the walls, there’s no power, there’s no fish tank left. The boy’s fish was on the floor, gasping, its tank shattered. Slaton ran into his son’s room after the shaking stopped. His 120-pound mastiff panicked and tried to run down the stairs, but the house was swaying so much that the dog was thrown into a wall and tumbled down the stairs, Slaton said. He described the quake as a 7.2, though it was unclear why his figure differed from that of the USGS. He was in an elevator in a high-rise Anchorage office building and said it was a “rough ride” coming down. Bill Walker issued a disaster declaration.

A large set of antlers appeared to have fallen off a wall of the living room. I imagine that’s the case for many, many others.” She posted a video of the inside of her parents’ home, with broken dishes littering the kitchen floor. Sarah Palin tweeted that her home was damaged: “Our family is intact - house is not.

#RECENT EARTHQUAKES IN ANCHORAGE ALASKA DRIVER#

Soon after the shaking ended, the school bus pulled up and the children boarded, but the driver stopped at a bridge and refused to go across because of deep cracks in the road, Lettow said.Īt Chugiak High School, acting principal Allison Susel said ceiling tiles came down, books and other items fell from shelves, and water line breaks caused damage.įormer Alaska Gov. “It’s one of those things where in your head, you think, ‘OK, it’s going to stop,’ and you say that to yourself so many times in your head that finally you think, ‘OK, maybe this isn’t going to stop,’” he said.

Recent earthquakes in anchorage alaska