Nuke plant shut down after US earthquake

A strong earthquake with its epicenter in central Virgina has caused two nuclear reactors at Louisa County's 1,806 megawatt, two-unit North Anna Power Station to be automatically taken offline. According to the US Geological Survey, the quake was given a preliminary magnitude of 5.8, though some reports have upgraded it to 5.9 …

[J 3]

Tilting?

Seriously!? I guess that, depending on the type of terrain it is on, it might be more concerning... I am 40 miles from the epicenter, and I didn't even leave my work building. At the 5th floor, we shook quite nicely, lighting fixtures moving, glassware tinkling in the lab shelves, but no need for panic... Buildings here will be inspected, as a precaution, but apart from a couple of walls in old houses, no other reports of damage have been made yet.

[Uncle Slacky]

Marshy

IIRC, most of DC was a fetid swamp (some would argue that it still is). I wonder how good the monument's foundations are...

[Anonymous Coward]

This is why we have Viagra

Keep it real, say no to the cheap imitations and generics made overseas.

Here in the US, we keep our phallic shaped icons straight, strong and proud.

Not like those I-talians and their leaning towers.

Oh did I also mention we also have Enzyte too?

[Aaron Em]

That why the top's cracked?

Good on you for waiting to hear the full story, tho.

[Mr_Pitiful]

this is a tit le

Did I read this correctly

Reactors shut down & backups running

So no nuclear breach like in Japan

Was the earthquake Middle East generated?

Do the powers that be maybe have a GRAZER II satellite up there

Tin Foil hat at the ready

[Destroy All Monsters]

Grazer?

Let me guess..

Gravitational Radiation through Zero-Point-Energy Resonances?

"the White House and the halls of Congress were evacuated"

And nothing of value was interrupted.

[Mips]

"the White House and the halls of Congress were evacuated"

Thought they were pretty vacuous anyway.

[Anonymous Coward]

With all the hot air constantly being added,

it's pretty near impossible to establish even a partial vacuum there...

Congress and Parliament: the REAL sources of anthropomorphic global warming.

[Aaron Em]

Anthropomorphic?

Global warming is Bigfoot?

[Al42]

Grazer

Read David Brins novel Earth...

Its a Gravity Laser using miniture Black holes ...

[Annihilator]

re: Grazer

Swing and a miss folks, see Under Siege 2: Dark Territories for details of a brilliantly obscure reference. It's a particle weapon equipped satelite that can target the subterranean levels of earth and cause earthquakes. Grazer (pronounced Grazier for some reason) One was destroyed at the end of the film. Apologies for lack of spoiler alert :-)

[Anonymous Coward]

Middle East generated...

You mean BoobQuake finally worked??

[Gary B.]

Well...

To be fair, there wasn't ALSO then a massive tsunami wave headed toward the reactors.

[Taters]

Tilting tower?

Perhaps our monument needs a little help from our little blue friend...

[GumboKing]

Fox News Alert!

Would it be a bigger story on Fox News if the Washington Monument was tilting left or tilting right?

Tilting Right headline: God sends sign that you should vote Republican!

Tilting Left head line: Liberal Commie quake forever scars DC landscape!

[Coulls]

Felt as far north as New England?

We felt it up in Toronto, Canada...

[Stevie]

Fools!

Aiee!

[Anonymous Coward]

2 cents

Felt it in Central NY. It lasted a lot longer than our usual quakes. On the other hand, we could actually feel this one.

[laird cummings]

Bouncy-bouncy

Shimmy-shimmy.

Fun ride while it lasted, but much too short, and no special effects to go with it.

I rate it more of a 3.0 than a 5.9.

'Course, I *am* a couple hundred miles away, too.

[Anonymous Coward]

Perhaps they don't have seismic retrofits in DC

But out here in Silicon Valley, evacuating major office buildings for a 5.9 gets you laughed at :)

[Aaron Em]

Are you kidding?

They don't even have snowplows in DC.

[kain preacher]

Prepare to laugh

I've worked at 2 places that did just that . One was ATT in San Ramon .

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes yes yes...

... but what about the Eurofighter??? Ah, um, different author!

[Hermes Conran]

yes, I was expecting Mr Page.....

to explain how great this triumph is.

[elderlybloke]

That 5.8 or 5.9

Richter scale , is not the scale that really matters.

It is the Modified Mercalli scale that really counts.

Also this is a region that concerns Seismologists ,as they think that the area is overdue of a good shake.

The last lot was in 1811-1812 when there was a series of 8 or more that gave very heavy ground motions , but fortunately it was only sparsely populated then.

NB. The Mississippi River course and grade was altered and flowed backwards briefly.

[Richard Pennington 1]

@elderlybloke

@elderlybloke - I think you are referring to the series of earthquakes at New Madrid - but those were a long way from Washington DC.

[Anonymous Coward]

on the emptying of the house and senate buildings

Hooray, think of all of the money that those fools weren't able to spend.

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, I expect this will be an excuse to bump it up.

Not entirely certain it would count as wasted, but they sent folks home early with pay, anywhere from 2 to 5 hours per person for all the federal agencies in the DC metropolitan area.

Plus, this is now a good reason/excuse to retrofit all the federal buildings in the area for Cali style earthquakes. That should be good for tens of billions in "emergency" spending.

[chuBb.]

surely should be in gigawatts?

1,806 megawatt or 1.8 Gigawatts more than enough for a delorian....

[Anonymous Coward]

I wonder if this has anything to do w. fracking that might be going on in that area?

No further comment.