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27^th of February 2008 an Earthquake said to be 5.3 on the Richter scale has been the most powerful quake in Lincolnshire since April 15^th 1185, But why did it happen well roughly 15 kilometres below the streets of Lincoln there are old fault lines running throughout county and changes in the pressure of the rocks in contrast to the ever shifting tectonic plates that make up the crust of our planet causes the earth to vibrate violently and the sound and vibrations can resonate for hundreds of miles before dying down. Back in the 18^th century part of Lincolns cathedral was destroyed thanks to the earth quake and it also levelled many houses too, although it did do very minor damage this time around it has managed to rack up an impressive ten million pounds worth of repairs.

 Ok so most of you slept through the Quake and because you weren’t woken up it can’t have been that bad and those of us who were awake (myself included) didn’t really know what was happening until the news about 45 minutes later, scared I was not but I was very confused then it got me thinking what if we have another what if we have another and it was ten maybe twenty times more powerful? Are our buildings our towers and sky scrapers built to withstand the force of earth quakes? What about the more un-noticeable problems like water mains and gas lines? Have they been installed to withstand vigorous shaking? No I imagine not, we get over 200 earth quakes a year the vast majority go un-noticed by the public, now places like America that sit atop large active fault lines like the Andrea’s fault can get away with few casualties and minor damage to property and buildings compared to less modern times thanks to the way their house and buildings are built using special rubber bricks and suspension foundations and because they know they have powerful “killer quakes” they have an efficient warning systems than can give the residents valuable minutes warning before a catastrophe hit… Do we?

Bruce Long

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