Last night’s earthquake (here) was the third I have experienced in Melbourne and of scale 5.3 – the last, in 2009, being much milder. Last night I noticed a very noisy outside disturbance which I assumed was a gust of wind striking the house or the trees hard. Then the room I was sitting in experienced shaking furniture and window sills for about 30 seconds. No damage but it was very noticeable and clearly an earthquake. I have no index what the initial noise was – certainly not the wind. Maybe it was the sound of the house moving. It wasn’t scary because it took the fully 30 seconds to internalise what was happening.
The earthquake was centred in a relatively active zone near Moe in Victoria. There have apparently been many aftershocks with the possibility of more to come. (158)
We felt it too at La Trobe Uni. It lasted for about 1 minute, strong enough to feel the walls moving.
You only worry about earthquakes when your fight or flight instinct is triggered.
Shelter crouching next to internal walls: doors are dangerous because they can tend to swing shut on you very fast.
The Christchurch mayor was thrown off his feet and hit the corner of a coffee table, breaking two ribs, and injuring his already sore back. That’s an earthquake.
You’ll like this one Harry:
https://twitter.com/djken11/status/215042779234045954/photo/1