Strong quake shakes Southern California

LOS ANGELES - A strong earthquake shook Southern California on Tuesday, causing buildings to sway and triggering some precautionary evacuations. No immediate damage was reported.

The jolt was felt from Los Angeles to San Diego, and slightly in Las Vegas.

Preliminary information from the U.S. Geological Survey estimated the quake at magnitude 5.8, centered 29 miles southeast of downtown Los Angeles near Chino Hills in San Bernardino County. Ten aftershocks occurred in the next dozen minutes, including three estimated at 3.8, and the U.S. Geological Survey estimated the quake was about 8 miles below the earth's surface.

Los Angeles Fire Department spokesman Brian Humphrey said there were no immediate reports of damage or injury in Los Angeles. San Bernardino County fire dispatch also had no immediate reports of damage.

The quake struck at 11:42 a.m. PDT. Buildings swayed in downtown Los Angeles for several seconds. Workers quickly evacuated some office buildings.

"It was dramatic. The whole building moved and it lasted for a while," said Los Angeles County sheriff's spokesman Steve Whitmore, who was in the sheriff's suburban Monterey Park headquarters east of Los Angeles.

In Orange County, about 2000 detectives were attending gang conference at a Marriott hotel in Anaheim when a violent jolt shook the main conference room.

Mike Willever, who was at the hotel, said, "First we heard the ceiling shaking, then the chandelier started to shake, then there was a sudden movement of the floor."

Chris Watkins, from San Diego, said he previously felt several earthquakes, but "that was one of the worst ones."

Delegates and guests at a cluster of hotels near the Disneyland resort spilled into the streets immediately after the quake.

The 1994 Northridge earthquake under Los Angeles' San Fernando Valley was magnitude 6.7. It killed 72 people, injured more than 9,000 and caused $25 billion in damage in the metropolitan area.

The damage created by an earthquake depends greatly on where it hits. A 7.1 quake — much stronger than Northridge — hit the Mojave Desert in 1999 but caused only a few injuries and no deaths.

California is one of the world's most seismically active regions. More than 300 faults crisscross the state, which sits atop two of Earth's major tectonic plates, the Pacific and North American plates. About 10,000 quakes each year rattle Southern California alone, although most of them are too small to be felt.

from:http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080729/ap_on_re_us/california_earthquake

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好久沒feel 地震了~~(聽起來是有點皮癢!)
地震當時正在打報告，地開始搖晃時我還在想我們家那"amigo"在跑吧，因為他有點胖，每次他走大力一點就可以隱約feel地在晃，但愈搖愈大力，心想就是"地震"~~但很怪的是，我沒反應要跑耶

我看著那台裝在我左上方的那台冷氣，我看他還好好地處在那裡，一點也沒有要像掉下來的樣子，所以我還可以繼續打我的字 (我怎麼上班那麼認真負責丫~~呵!!) 老闆跑來說: 是地價。 我還淡淡的回答他說，是~~~丫~~~，東西沒有掉下來!!  (我想他臉上該有3條線)

之後就狂call住在震區附近的朋友 (我上班的地方離震央約快1小時路程遠)~~電話都打不通，就傳msg!!!!
他們都是在地震後10-20後才get msg!!!才跟我說~~~小姐你反應很慢耶。啥咪!! 我早在 10-20分鐘就sent了啦!!

說真的 ，我還真的一點也沒有緊張想跑的feeling。在921時，我只是覺得床很搖，但一點也不想爬起床，還是繼續覺我的覺~~~若果真，那一天真的是大地震，或是震央就是剛好是我住的地方~那麼後果真的是難以想像丫!!

anyway，至少目前為止，沒有聽到有人受傷，就是消息啦!! 希望地震不會來