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Nancy Grace
5.8 Magnitude Earthquake Hits Washington D.C.;
Aired August 23, 2011 - 20:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Following breaking news, reports of a powerful earthquake in the Washington, D.C., area, strong jolts felt at the Pentagon, the Capitol, also up and down the East Coast.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was scary. And then they just started -- they just started evacuating everybody. And it was crazy. Like, you see it out here, like, just crazy, the whole steps, like, right there, down in the crack. Everything was just moving. And I was just, like -- it was kind of scary.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I really and truly thought it was some kind of bomb because I never felt nothing like that before in Washington in regards to an earthquake. And I started seeing the roof collapse and some parts of the food court and towers flying down. And that`s when everyone was scattering, trying to get from the bottom of the food court to get up to the first floor to get out of Union Station.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: TVs were shaking on the wall. And I didn`t think anyone really realized what was happening. Everybody sat still for a moment.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Everything just started to shake a little bit, and then it was just, like, a little bit (INAUDIBLE) a little bit confused.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This standard has protected...
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK, OK, OK. I`ve been through earthquakes in Seattle.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Everyone is saying to one another, What was it? What was it? An earthquake, frankly, not the kind of thing that people here are expecting to have happen.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Then you could really feel -- feel the pounding, and it -- and there was a real jolt and I`m guessing it lasted for 20 or 30 seconds.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And I understand there`s cell phone problems. People are trying to reach their loved ones and all the lines are jammed there.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I knew something wasn`t right. The shaking went on for about -- I`d say about 40 seconds. And soon after that, the fire warden came on, made an announcement here to the Stock Exchange, saying, No evacuations right now, expect some aftershocks.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is lower Manhattan in New York City and certainly a jittery place, 10-year anniversary of 9/11 coming up, everyone very sensitive.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Immediately, I knew that it was an earthquake. The ground was swaying from side to side.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You could feel your knees buckle. You could feel sort of weak and almost queasy on your feet, like, you know, What do I do now? And instantly, one thing that we noticed here was, you know, when people try to get on their cell phones, nobody can make a phone call.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
NANCY GRACE, HOST: Good evening. I`m Nancy Grace. I want to thank you for being with us. Bombshell tonight, live, a massive earthquake rocks the U.S.
Straight out to Richard Roth, CNN correspondent. Richard, what happened?
RICHARD ROTH, CNN SENIOR U.N. CORRESPONDENT: We were here covering the Dominique Strauss-Kahn sex assault case. The criminal charges were dropped. People kind of started to relax out here. He had already left the court.
And I was standing with several of our CNN colleagues, and I felt like this, the sidewalk swaying. But this location where I am in front of the criminal courts is really right over many New York subway underground train lines. So you`re used to kind of hearing a rumble underneath.
And I said, Oh, that`s the train. But our satellite engineer, Mike Morrissey (ph), said, No, that`s an earthquake. And then we talked to some people who were standing nearby. No one was running. There was really no panic outside here. And this other person said it was a quake. And then massive evacuations of local buildings around here.
BYRNES: Straight out to Michael Caposole, CNN iReporter. He captured video of the earthquake. Everyone, we are live tonight, an earthquake rocking the Eastern Seaboard. You`ve got to worry about the Capitol, the Pentagon, Reagan International (SIC) Airport shut down.
Straight out to Michael Caposole. Michael, what happened?
MICHAEL CAPOSOLE, CNN IREPORTER: Hey, how you doing, Nancy? So I was sitting in my room here, you know, just doing some work on the computer, and you know, all of a sudden, I just felt really dizzy. And I got real queasy, and you know, I wasn`t really sure what was going on. But then all of a sudden, I heard some noises, and I look up and I see my chandelier and the lights in the background all shaking, you know? And then I realized this was an earthquake. It was really strange. So then...
(CROSSTALK)
GRACE: Go ahead.
CAPOSOLE: Yes, so basically, I just -- I tried to run in between the doorway here because I wasn`t sure how long it was going to last or what. And then I just ran out front of my house, just to -- because I felt like it was safer outside, you know?
GRACE: One of the most powerful earthquakes in recorded history has been felt by millions along the Eastern Seaboard. Right now, everything in Washington, D.C., on hold as the damage is being assessed. We are taking your calls live.
To Juan Carlos Lopez, CNN Espanol correspondent, who was on the set when the earthquake shook the Eastern Seaboard. Juan, thank you for being with us. Describe what happened.
Uh-oh. We`ve lost Juan by satellite. We`ll be right back with him.
Everything up in the air. Everyone, you`re seeing the footage of what went down in Washington, D.C.. A massive earthquake, nearly a 6 on the Richter scale, hits our nation`s capital. We are taking your calls live.
To Dr. Patrick Abbott, professor of geology at the University of San Diego, author of "Natural Disasters." Dr. Abbott, we had a quake today not only in our nation`s capital that was felt as far away as Georgia, but also an almost equal quake in Colorado. What`s going on?
DR. PATRICK ABBOTT, GEOLOGIST, SAN DIEGO STATE UNIV. (via telephone): The earth is shaking, as usual. We get particularly interested when it hits the areas where we live. Now, southernmost Colorado had a 5.3. But that`s, you know, 2,000 miles away from the Eastern Seaboard, two small for those things to be related.
That 5.8 that you all felt, you feel it very, very significantly. In California, we have younger rocks, so when we have a 5.8 magnitude earthquake, the younger, softer rocks absorb that energy more rapidly. On the East Coast, your rocks are much harder, and those harder rocks transmit the energy. So the same size earthquake in the East Coast is felt over a much wider area, as you`re experiencing with people from New York to Washington, D.C., to Maryland and so much of the Eastern Seaboard.
GRACE: It is believed that some of the national monuments have sustained damage. The Reagan National Airport evacuated because of gas. We are taking your calls. You`re seeing footage that`s going on in Washington, D.C., a quake also in Colorado at nearly the same time.
Straight now to Juan Carlos Lopez. Juan, what happened? You were on the set when it happened.
JUAN CARLOS LOPEZ, CNN ESPANOL ANCHOR: We were ready -- we were about to begin our show, Nancy, and all of a sudden, I felt the floor moving. I told one of my colleagues, Brian (ph), that the floor was moving. He said, No, no, no. Then all of a sudden, everything started shaking from side to side. It lasted about 15 seconds. It was pretty strong. And it was very scary. Then the building was evacuated. We were all sent out, and about an hour later, allowed to return.
GRACE: We are taking your calls live. To Myra in West Virginia. Hi, Myra. What`s your question?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hi, Nancy. I live in an apartment complex, and what I don`t understand is we didn`t feel anything. But like, a mile away from me, the Mining (ph) Academy -- my sister-in-law works at the newspaper office, and she immediately called the coal mines where my brother works. And my brother, he works in 32-inch coal, he felt it. And he thought maybe the brake was loose on the buggy. And then Rupert (ph) in the coal mines, they`ve got an alarm set, but it won`t go off unless it`s 2 point something. So the earthquake there hit that because the alarm went off. And we were just afraid that we`d have another performance (ph) coal (ph), you know? And I`m just wondering how it can hit, and one mile away, you know, and...
GRACE: Good question. Let`s go to Dr. Patrick Abbott, professor of geology. Can you answer her question?
ABBOTT: Indeed. We could almost say that no two people experience the same earthquake. Now, admittedly, the fault movement generates and sends out the same amount of energy, but somebody in a coal mine deep within the earth is going to feel different amounts of energy than somebody standing on the land surface. Are you standing on a hard rock or are you standing on soft sand? Is the apartment building a wood frame building, or is it a brick building? Is the sofa you`re sitting on oriented north/south or is it oriented east/west?
I`m giving you a few of the kinds of variables that make people have very different experiences from the same earthquake.
GRACE: You are seeing video. Breaking right now in Washington, a quake hit our nation`s capital. Some of our national monuments now a big concern for damage to them. And near the epicenter of the quake, a nuclear reactor has now been shut down. But it`s spewing steam as we go to air.
We are taking your calls. To Lavonda in Virginia. Hi, Lavonda. What`s your question?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hi, Nancy. This is Lavonda. Usually, we`re more prepared for, like, hurricanes and stuff like that here. I live about 45 minutes from Virginia Beach. And my question is -- would be to you, you know, I know that after earthquakes, you know, there`s a possibility of a tsunami. And with us being so close to, you know, the waterfront like that, what would be the possibility? Or was it strong enough to have a possible tsunami?
GRACE: Good question. Let`s go back to Abbott. We just lived through the tsunami. What about that possibility here in the U.S.?
ABBOTT: For this type of an earthquake, no tsunami is possible. One, the earthquake is too small. It`s usually around magnitude 7.5 that we get a tsunami of any significance. And then that fault movement has to offset the ocean floor. This is too small. And being inland, there would be zero tsunami threat.
GRACE: The (INAUDIBLE) North Anna nuclear power plant declared on alert, apparently spewing steam now. That is very close to our nation`s capital and close to the epicenter of this earthquake.
Dr. Abbott, when we refer to the epicenter, what are we describing?
ABBOTT: The epicenter is the point on the surface of the ground directly above where the earth moved underground.
GRACE: Everyone, we are live in Washington and New York. A massive earthquake, nearly 6 on the Richter scale, has shaken the Eastern Seaboard.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I just looked out the window. I saw the building shake. We were in a meeting. I said, I need to leave. I went and grabbed my purse. I said, I`m going.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I was on the line with someone in Virginia, and they were telling us, It`s shaking and shaking. What is it? And then I said, It`s shaking over here, too.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There was a small vibration, and then it got worse and worse and worse and worse. And I thought, Gosh, we really must be having an earthquake. I looked out the window, but I couldn`t see anything moving.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I`ve lived through over 50 earthquakes. So my feet are really sensitive. So I felt the first light tremor. And I even told a co-worker, I said, We`re having an earthquake. He said, I didn`t feel a thing. And then the big punch hit, the building rattled, and I grabbed my coat, cell phone and said, Let`s get out.
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UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Everything just started to shake a little bit.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A rare shocker for the eastern United States, an earthquake hits southwest of Washington, D.C.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Just felt the whole floor move. Everything just moved.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: 5.9 earthquake that was felt all along the East Coast. The jolt sent people running into the streets.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was scary. And then they just started -- they just started evacuating everybody. The ground was moving.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Rattles nerves all along the East Coast, frightened people pouring out of buildings.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The building shook back and forth. It actually rocked.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And now the region keeps a nervous watch for possible aftershocks.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: As far south as North Carolina and as far north as New York City, people evacuated buildings.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: We are live and taking your calls as an earthquake strikes the Eastern Seaboard at our nation`s capital.
Straight out to Chad Myers, CNN severe weather expert. Chad, what`s happening?
CHAD MYERS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: This was a big quake for where we had it. A 5.8 earthquake in California`s probably not a very big deal, Nancy. But where we don`t build buildings to isolate the shaking, like in the U.S., in the eastern U.S. because we don`t expect it, like we do in California, you get a shake. Originally, it stops for a while, and then it shook again at 5.8. And it shook for a full minute. And then it kind of calmed down for a while. But people`s nerves were certainly, certainly rattled.
Here`s what happened today. We`ll put the earthquake epicenter on here, just in the western parts of Virginia, west of Richmond, Virginia. But the problem on the East Coast, unlike the West Coast, is that this is all just one really big old, old ancient plate. And so when it shook in one spot, the entire plate, Nancy, shook. It rang like a bell.
You could literally -- you could feel it in Alabama. You could feel it in Ontario. I got e-mails from Quebec and Montreal saying, We`re feeling it up here.
Now, in California, the plate is broken up into a million pieces because of all of the faults. So in California, if this right here shakes, the people over here don`t even feel it because it`s isolated. It`s insulated. It`s broken. This shakes, but this doesn`t even move.
On the East Coast, the entire East Coast shook today and the East Coast moved. For a while, the towers at LaGuardia, JFK, Newark were evacuated, no planes in or out for a while. Train service was shut down for a while between Boston, even to New York and Baltimore. It was a big deal for people who -- well, I guess, by the time -- you don`t get used to it in the United States, the eastern United States. It rattled some nerves big-time.
GRACE: To Susan Candiotti, joining us, CNN correspondent. Susan, with it being so close to the nation`s capital, with the FBI evacuating, so close to the Pentagon, our national monuments, what`s the backup plan? I understand the president was not in the capital, but what do you do? What do you do, and what`s the backup plan for his safety?
SUSAN CANDIOTTI, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, for his safety, clearly, you have to get him to a safe location. Certainly, there are secret locations where our major officials are taken, including the president of the United States. We remember, of course, what happened after 9/11. You know, people were put on planes and they`re taken out of where they are.
And here in New York, there was no need for that, of course, in this particular case, fortunately, because the shaking wasn`t that bad. There was no major damage. But it sure rattled a lot of people and caused major and very high-structure high-rises here to be evacuated.
Not only that, Nancy, but here, so close to the 10th anniversary of 9/11, people are naturally a bit on edge to begin with. So when you start to feel the shake rolling -- the ground rolling and shaking underneath you, you wonder. I was eight stories up in a news conference, you might know, for the Dominique Strauss-Kahn case. The district attorney had just started talking when all of a sudden, the floor started shaking.
And my first thought was, Is this a bomb? Did something go off in the bottom of the building? But then quickly realized something was amiss, and you thought it could be a earthquake here. And quickly, all of us followed the district attorney down eight floors, down the stairwell, to get the heck out of the building.
GRACE: Everyone, a quake hitting our nation`s capital at nearly the same time a quake hitting in Colorado. This is what we know now. The FBI evacuates. National monuments closed. Damage to certain national monuments. The National Cathedral damaged. Power plants shut down in six states. Aftershocks as far as Toronto and Ohio. Nuclear power plant just miles from the capital shut down. Airports now shut down and evacuated.
We are taking your calls live. Two reactors near the quake taken down, plant venting and spewing steam. We are live in D.C. and New York as the aftershocks are feared.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: A 5.9 magnitude earthquake shook millions along the Eastern Seaboard.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The building shook back and forth.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Almost like hitting an iron bell.
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UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We are getting reports of a 5.8 earthquake.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It felt scary. I felt I was light-headed, like I was fainting. And then I saw the mirrors move and the computer.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We felt this earthquake. People went down the stairwells, out into the street. There are many other nuclear events (ph) in the zone that was affected by this earthquake. All of them, too, have registered an unusual event.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Aftershocks, modest aftershocks after this 5.8 earthquake.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The building began shaking rather violently. I will tell you, hundreds of people started streaming out.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Magnitude of 5.8, pretty powerful. It was centered near Mineral, Virginia.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: 5.8 -- that`s a pretty significant earthquake.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was really something.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A chair across the room shake.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Like a Christmas tree here in the newsroom as we all just felt that trembling. Residents throughout the region called WTOP wondering if their hunch was right, did they just, in fact, experience an earthquake?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Like a wave, but it felt like my -- you know, like trembling.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It felt scary. I felt I was light-headed, like I was fainting. And I saw the mirrors move and the computer. So I got up and we took the stairs out of the building.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Welcome back. We are taking your calls live. We are live in New York and Washington as one of the biggest quakes in eastern history strikes. In the last hours, an earthquake also striking in Colorado. The Lincoln and Jefferson Memorials closed. Washington Monument taped off for damage. National Cathedral center tower damaged. Smithsonian building cracked. Reagan National Airport evacuated due to gas smell. The FBI leaves (ph). Airports shut down. Evacuations from major buildings. Two reactors near the quake`s epicenter closed down, spewing steam.
Straight out to Dr. Reggie Desroches, professor of civil and environmental engineering at Georgia Tech, in the Ronald Reagan building when this occurs. Dr. Desroches, thank you for being with us. What happened?
REGGIE DESROCHES, PROF. OF CIVIL & ENV. ENGINEERING, GA TECH (via telephone): Well, I had just walked through the building and went through the security, and within a few seconds of passing through security, there was extreme rumbling in the building. It was about five seconds -- five seconds long.
I immediately thought it was a bomb. I left the building. Security said everybody had to evacuate the building. I went outside, and everybody was running out. I asked somebody if other buildings were shaking, and they said yes. And then I immediately realized it must have been an earthquake.
GRACE: Everyone, you are seeing video of what has occurred in the last hours in our nation`s capital. An earthquake has struck, nearly a 6 on the Richter scale. We are taking your calls, and we`ll stay live at the capital and New York.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: As the building began shaking rather violently, I will tell you hundreds of people started streaming out.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We could hear the glass creaking.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Thousands evacuated buildings.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE REPORTER: Following breaking news, reports of a powerful earthquake in the Washington, D.C. are, strong jolts felt at the Pentagon, the capital, also up and down the east coast.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It was scary. They just started evacuating everybody. And it was crazy, like, you see it out here, like, it is just crazy. The whole steps, like, right there down in the crack, everything was just moving and I was just, like, it is kind of scary.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I really and truly thought it was some kind of bomb because I never felt nothing like that before in Washington in regards to earthquake. And I started to see the roof collapse and some of the food court and tower was flying down. And that`s when everyone was scattering trying to get from the bottom of the food court to get up to the first floor to get out of union station.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: TVs were shaking on the wall. I don`t think anyone really realized what was happening. Everyone sat still for a moment.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Everything started to shake a little bit. And then, a little bit everybody was a little bit confused.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This standard has protected -
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The floor is shaking.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I`ve been through two earthquakes in Seattle.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE REPORTER: Everyone saying to one another what was it, what was it? An earthquake, frankly, not the kind of thing that people here are expecting to have happen.
WOLF BLITZER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Then you could really feel, feel the pounding and it - there was a real jolt and I`m guessing it lasted for 20 or 30 seconds.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And I understand there are cell phone problems. People are trying to reach their loved ones and all of the lines are jammed there.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE REPORTER: I knew something wasn`t right. The shaking went on for about, I`d say, for about 40 seconds.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
NANCY GRACE, HLN HOST: We`re live in Washington and New York.
An earthquake rocks the eastern seaboard at our nation`s capital and now fears for an aftershock. Straight back out to Chad Myers. What about the threat of aftershock?
CHAD MYERS, AMS METEOROLOGIST: Certainly aftershocks all the way up to 4.8. Now, how do I get that number? Because the original quake was 5.8. And typically you can get an aftershock one magnitude smaller, so 4.8. We`ve already had a few in the 2.5 to 2.8 range.
Now, this could have been considered a 4 shock, that`s much more scary. Because a 4 shock, although what happens only about an hour before the big quake, then it could have been something much larger. But now that we haven`t had that, things have settled down for a few hours. We don`t expect that this is the first one. We expect that this is actually the biggest quake and that the next ones will be much smaller, but right under that area, the 2.5, 2.8, that`s enough to rattle nerves.
Plus, plus, Nancy, you already have chimneys, you have concrete things out there especially that are not, they`re not there to withstand earthquakes that are already damaged. You get a 3.5 or a 4.5, those things could fall down. The first thing I saw all day was people leaving the buildings and going out and standing right next to the buildings on the sidewalk. That`s exactly what you don`t want to do.
You either want to stay in the building in a very safe place in the building, or go out and get away from the building so that in case things fall off the building, you`re not down below. You need to be in the middle of the street or get to a park, you don`t want to be standing right below the building itself --Nancy.
GRACE: Unleash the lawyers. Joining us out of our nation`s capital, Eleanor Odom with the national district attorney`s association. And Jim Elliott, the city attorney for Warner Robins.
Eleanor Odom, what happened?
ELEANOR ODOM, SENIOR ATTORNEY, NATIONAL DISTRICT ATTORNEY`S ASSOCIATION: Well, Nancy, my office is on the Potomac River and I was just sitting at my desk, talking on the phone. And the next thing I knew underneath I felt shifting and it just got bigger and scarier. It`s very, very frightening. I knew, I thought this is an earthquake. But that can`t be because we`re in, you know, D.C., how could that be?
But it was very frightening and everybody in my office, we evacuated the buildings. We have several buildings along the Potomac where our offices are located. So very, very frightening today.
GRACE: And to you, Jim Elliott, we heard the FBI - can I see the lawyers, please? We hear the FBI evacuates. You know that police are completely inundated with phone calls with people that are afraid, they don`t know what`s going on, this is a perfect time for criminals to strike.
JIM ELLIOT, CITY ATTORNEY, TOWN OF WARNER ROBINS: Well, definitely is, Nancy. And you know, the thing I`m struck by is the local government attorney, these are situations where you have to have emergency powers given to your local law enforcement folks to handle situations like the videos we have seen this evening of massive crowds in the streets and the kind of chaos that can take over in that situation.
GRACE: Well, another thing, Jim Elliott, is that now we`re expecting aftershocks. Already, everybody is afraid, they`re worried the power is going to go out, the airport is shut down, a taste of what we all live through in New York on 9/11, but now that criminals realize there will be aftershocks where everybody will be rushing out of buildings again, they`ll be defenseless, outside, exactly where they shouldn`t be, Jim, what do you do?
ELLIOT: Well, that`s again where you given hopefully by federal state and local law, powers to law enforcement to do extraordinary things like evacuate buildings and impose curfews, some of those sorts of things that can address those situations. You just have to be prepared and have the powers in place to exercise when it is necessary to do so.
GRACE: Out to the lines. Maria in Virginia. Hi, Maria. What`s your question?
MARIA, CALLER, VIRGINIA: That was the most bizarre thing that I have ever been through.
GRACE: You mean the earthquake?
MARIA: Yes.
GRACE: What happened?
MARIA: I was walking down the hall of our house, and the house started shaking and first I thought maybe, maybe there were helicopters overhead. But then my son thought maybe the dishwasher was about to blow up, we didn`t know what it was. Until we turned the TV on.
GRACE: Let`s go out to David Russ, USGS regional executive for the northeast area. David, thank you for being with us. Where does this earthquake measure as compared to others in the region?
DAVID RUSS, USGS REGIONAL EXECUTIVE, NORTHEAST ASIA (via telephone): Actually, right near the top. We had an earthquake about 100 years ago, 1897, and in Charles County, Virginia, near Blacksburg, Virginia, and 5.9, so this is very close to that. And it is not surprising to see some of the reaction of some of the listeners because they haven`t experienced anything like this during their lifetime or probably that of their parents.
Well, David Russ, everyone, joining us. Can the aftershocks cause as much damage?
RUSS: Generally not. It simply won`t have quite the degree of shaking necessary to cause as much damage even as what we had earlier today. And also to be remembered in terms of what can you do to respond, those kinds of events will be so short in duration, will be almost over before they start.
In other words, they`ll probably be felt for at just one or two or three seconds at the most and will be hard to do reacting, turns are getting out of doors can certainly dock and cover and try to get under a desk are a big table, but those will be short in duration.
GRACE: Back to Doctor Reggie Desroches, professor of civil and environmental engineering. He was there in the Reagan building today. Doctor Desroches, again, thank you for being with us. The big difference between D.C. and, for instance, California, buildings and bridges in California on the west coast are built out of fear of earthquakes, parking decks, you name it have been structurally built with earthquakes in mind. Not so in D.C.
DOCTOR REGGIE DESROCHES, PROFESSOR, CIVIL AND ENVIRONMENTAL ENGINEERING, GA TECH: Yes. And that`s the big concern. A lot of us who study earthquakes have is places on the east coast like D.C. or St. Louis or Charleston that have a history of infrequent earthquakes but can be large. When that earthquake does strike, those buildings can potentially be significantly damaged compared to what would happen in California where they prepare for earthquakes since they have them very frequently.
GRACE: And what many of us are concerned about, Doctor Desroches, is the structural damage and collapse of buildings and even residential structures. What about that, Doctor Desroches?
DESROCHES: That`s very possible. For a 5.8, you certainly don`t expect significant collapse. We didn`t see much here. I walked the streets, walked back to the Reagan building to my hotel, didn`t see very much structural damage, nonstructural or structural damage, very little glass. And so clearly this was a bigger earthquake, like a 7.0, what we had in California, you can expect buildings -
GRACE: And to Doctor Leslie Austin, psychotherapist, I know New York City must be on edge. This is eerily reminiscent of 9/11.
DOCTOR LESLIE AUSTIN, PSYCHOTHERAPIST: It is. And it is important for everybody to notice nobody was hurt, and stay calm. I felt it myself at home and it was a very strange experience. You need to stay calm and have a plan.
GRACE: Everybody, we`re live in D.C. and New York as a quake rocks the eastern seaboard as far away as Canada, Ohio, Georgia.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: People went down the stair wells, out into the street.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Eleven million people that actually felt some shaking.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: An earthquake.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE REPORTER: Breaking news, reports of a strong earthquake in the Washington, D.C. area.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I knew something wasn`t right when I saw the monitor start swaying.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: When it started shaking, people did not know what was happening.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Like a wave, but it felt like trembling.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Magnitude of 5.8, pretty powerful.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Just a lot of people right now milling around the streets.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hundreds of people started streaming out.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A rare shocker for the eastern United States.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You know, we don`t see it happen on the east coast.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Felt hundreds of miles away.
BLITZER: Really feel -- feel the pounding and it - there was a real jolt.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Now the region keeps a nervous watch for possible aftershocks.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: This is from a news conference that came to a halt because of all of the shaking.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: All of a sudden, the floor started to shake.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What is that?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Feels like an earthquake.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That`s an earthquake.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The stuff on the desk was shaking.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I said, did you feel it? He said, yes, it was scary, really scary.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: In a room, it felt like someone was shaking the back of your chair, TVs were shaking on the wall.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
GRACE: Welcome back. We`re live both in D.C. and New York.
A powerful earthquake, nearly a six on the Richter scale, has struck our nation`s capital.
According to the NRC, the U.S. nuclear regulatory commission, 12 other nuclear plants beside the north end plant now closed due to unusual events. The North Anna plant closes to the quake epicenter, still spewing steam, according to our reports.
We`re taking your calls. And I want to go back to Chad Myers. Chad, everyone is very concerned about aftershocks, but also what is the possibility of predicting an earthquake?
MYERS: Well, not very good. We just - we haven`t got to that point yet. There are some theories and some models about tides and moon phases and pull of the sun and the moon, but typically there is nothing that we can do. There was nothing to predict this. What this predicts, what this 5.8 predicts is that there will be aftershocks. That`s all we can do from now on. This can take another three to five months for the earth to really calm down. All the aftershocks, that`s like thinking, OK, it shook and it moved this much, but that was too much to be even. Now it has to go back halfway. That was too much that way. Now back that way. So these aftershocks get smaller and smaller and smaller the farther we get away from the time of the shake.
But the shake was felt all the way to Buffalo, Montreal, through D.C., and into Montgomery, Alabama, and Atlanta, Georgia, because this isn`t an area where we have a lot of faults breaking up the earth. There is small faults and there may have been very large earthquakes 2,000 years ago, Nancy.
But how would we know? There were probably giant earthquakes a million years ago. How would we know? We`re still under some earthquake faults here in the east coast. We just don`t know where they all are.
GRACE: You know, it is so bizarre to many people on the east coast because you often think of quakes happening out west, not here. Well, they do. This is a prime example. We are, in fact, on a fault.
We are taking your calls. Live to Dr. Bill Manion, medical examiner for New Jersey, DNA consultant. You know, there are a lot of fears with damage to buildings including a lot of our national monuments right now about injuries, crumbling. Even if something like a penny or a ham sandwich falls out of a building way high up, it can cause serious damage.
DOCTOR BILL MANION M.D., MEDICAL EXAMINER, FORENSIC PATHOLOGIST, STATE OF NEW JERSEY, DNA CONSULTANT: Absolutely. And some buildings with, especially with the stone structures up top, they can deteriorate and crumble on themselves. Sometimes they fall on their own. So, with all this shaking and with aftershocks, certainly there would be concern about that.
At our hospitals in New Jersey, we did evacuate our hospitals. And we`re outside for a few minutes. Thank goodness, you know, our patients were OK. And things calmed down. The guards checked everything and we were allowed to go back in. But it is extremely unusual experience, absolutely. I never felt anything like that in my life.
GRACE: Joining us now, special guest Sam Champion, you see him every day on ABC`s "GMA." Sam, weigh in.
SAM CHAMPION, WEATHER CORRESPONDENT, GOOD MORENING AMERICA (via telephone): Hey, Nancy. I got to tell you, you know for this to be such an unusual situation, one of the things that I learned in this earthquake is I had always looked for visible fault lines. And in doing all the research today, with the USGS, there is so much we don`t know about these east coast earthquakes and many of them that haven`t happened for more than 100 years.
And one of the things is they don`t have to be along visible fault lines. In some cases, fault lines are buried well below where we`ll be able to detect them and earthquakes happen in zones that don`t even have fault lines that we have ever been able to detect or research.
So the fact that we have thought in our small minds in our small scientific minds that earthquakes had to be found only in those zones, with the fault lines, which would be California or New Madrid or even that fault line the Ramapo fault that runs across New Jersey, to find out in this case that that doesn`t even have to be true means that we really have to open up and study a lot more about what is going on below the ground that we`re standing on.
GRACE: In other words, Sam Champion, basically the traditional conventional thinking about earthquakes and where they will occur, out the window.
CHAMPION: Oh, absolutely. This proves to me that there is just so much that we still don`t know about how and why our earth is shifting and these zones that are being discovered right now, just because we`re having earthquakes on them. I mean, didn`t have a scientist come along and say, hey, there might be an earthquake here in a week, a month or a year, it just happened. And the major populated areas of this country weren`t prepared for it and we`re right in the middle of what could have been a disaster had it been just a touch worse.
GRACE: With us, Sam Champion, on ("GMA") from ABC.
To Andrew J. Scott, former chief of police, Boca Raton, president of AJS consulting. When a disaster strikes, like an earthquake, there are so many repercussions. A, how does 911 system handle massive calls? And how are police trained to handle the obvious that is going to happen? Damage, injuries, looting, opportunist crime. Weigh in, Scott.
ANDERW J. SCOTT, FMR CHIEF OF POLICE, BOCA RATON, PRESIDENT, AJS CONSULTING: Absolutely. Police departments are trained on emergency management. However, along the east coast, earthquakes are so unusual that law enforcement folks are not trained in responding to those types of activities. That being said, an emergency is an emergency, but an earthquake is so pervasive, as we felt in Virginia, clearly up to Canada, that law enforcement, when they have an isolated incident, they normally ask for mutual aid. But in this case, mutual aid would not be prevalent because everybody along the eastern seaboard, law enforcement in particular, would be dealing with the overload of 9/11 calls, possibly looting but I don`t think that occurred thus far in addition to other calls for service.
GRACE: Back to the lawyers, Eleanor Odom, Jim Elliott.
Jim, we heard of several hospitals being evacuated, some they have resumed normal procedure. Not so blanket. So, long story short we saw the worst nightmares come true for instance in New Orleans when disaster struck. What is the duty of hospital, day care, rest home workers and in a situation like this you can`t just leave your patients there. That`s what we saw happen in New Orleans.
ELLIOT: Exactly, Nancy. That`s a responsibility that someone assumes when they take assume the role of being a caretaker for someone else. You`ve got to be - can`t be negligent in good times or in bad times.
GRACE: Does it rise to a criminal level, Jim?
ELLIOT: You know, certainly I think in New Orleans we saw situations where it did rise to a criminal level. Typically I think that`s not going to be the case. Because you ask people to simply act reasonable under the circumstances.
GRACE: And very quickly back to Sam Champion from ABC`s ("GMA").
Sam, this has knocked everybody you know flat. Nobody predicted this. No one could see it coming. Is there any way to predict an earthquake, Sam Champion?
CHAMPION: Nancy, in known fault zones they have measurements. They can do it. In unknown fault zones, the answer is obviously no.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Earthquake hits southwest of Washington, D.C.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: One of the strongest earthquakes ever to rock the east coast.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Reports of a 5.8 earthquake.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Back out to Sam Champion joining us from ABC. Sam, I`m sure you felt the quake yourself. My question is about aftershock.
CHAMPION: Nancy, I know that from what I was reading they know of two so far. And you don`t always have an aftershock with an earthquake. But it`s very common to have them. And even some that you and I might not feel but would be detected by equipment. So I would certainly for days after be on the lookout for other quakes in that zone, in that area that would qualify as an aftershock to this. Certainly I would be on the lookout for that.
GRACE: Back to Eleanor Odom joining us from D.C., one of our regulars.
Eleanor, you were in the midst of all this. What is the mood? What`s happening in D.C. right now? The rest of the country wants to know.
ODOM: Well, everybody was very frightened, Nancy. I think people are calming down now, but everybody`s talking about it. People were outside the buildings very upset needless to say. We couldn`t get through on our phones. All the lines were jammed. So, it was very serious. And I think what struck me most of all was how unprepared we al were. We didn`t really know what to do. Everybody was just kind of standing around and somebody said earlier we were standing right there by the building. So, it was all very, very frightening. But again, we calmed down a little bit now.
GRACE: You know, back to you, Sam Champion. All of us in New York on 9/11 swore we`d be ready for the next thing that happened. Well, obviously nobody is, Sam.
CHAMPION: Yes, Nancy. And it`s one of those things that I think it was the point was just made on your show. I think it`s critically important to say it. That an emergency is an emergency is an emergency. And you`ve got to have that plan in place. Whether you don`t think your zone is capable of getting tornadoes, we`ve seen that areas of the country that haven`t previously had them in 150 or 100 years have recently had them. Well, if you don`t think your area of the country is prone to flooding, we have that too. And now, we have an earthquake -
GRACE: Let`s stop and remember Army Private First Class Kevin Ellenburg, 20, Middleburg, killed Iraq. From a family of Vet, awarded bronze star purple heart, combat infantry. Loved football, golf, time with family and friends. Remembered for a big personality. Leaves behind parents Kenneth and Julie, stepparents Amy and Darryl, brother Andrew, sister Jessica. Kevin Ellenburg, American hero.
Thanks to our guests but especially to you. And a special good night from Georgia dn Texas friends, Kylie and Brandy.
Everyone, two special guests that want to say good night. Come here, sweet heart.
Good night from my little super heroes John David and Lucy. We were all safe and sound at the time of the quake.
Everyone, I`ll see you tomorrow night 8:00 sharp eastern. And until then, good night, friend.
END
