please empty your brain below
I also felt the 2008 quake here in North London, but I recognised it as I'd been in a bigger 'quake in Utsunomiya, Japan which involved sirens and earthquake drill in a shaking hotel.

Steve | 30.01.23 - 8:14 a.m. | #

I think I slept through the London 2008 quake, but have felt a few small ones in Toronto-- the 5.4 in 1998 must be one I'm thinking of.

James | 30.01.23 - 8:24 a.m. | #

I've apparently been in several minor quakes, but I've never once noticed it and score myself a 0 on that. When I lived in a block of flats, they were renovating the parking garage and a backhoe went through the floor and fell 3 stories to the ground (driver injured, but ok). That's the only time I thought I felt an earthquake, and possibly why I dismissed all the others as nothing to be concerned over.

Chz | 30.01.23 - 8:38 a.m. | #

I felt one destabilising shift of my 2nd floor office in a steel-framed 1930s building and said to my workmate, “Blimey that was an earthquake wave!”
That was in S. Kensington, the Geological Survey appropriately. It turned out to have come from beneath the Llŷn. 1984. So a 1.

Volcano 1. Nea Kameni’s fuming vents and also White Island, NZ, thankfully some while before its sudden gas blast killed a number of people.

Tornado 1. I watched a whirling cone reach down from a fast-moving cloud over Gidea Park in the 60s. Weird sight.

Herbof | 30.01.23 - 8:46 a.m. | #

Experienced an earthquake in Japan. We were staying in a ryokan (hotel) near the Sakurajima volcano on the island of Kyushu. In bed when all the sliding screens started rattling. Being Japanese, my wife immediately recognised what it was, as earthquakes are very frequent. Everyone is trained, including school children, as to what to do, which is mainly to get under a table. All cupboards are equipped with special catches to prevent doors opening and spewing the contents across the room.

Keith | 30.01.23 - 8:53 a.m. | #

I was in Nice in France in 1995, I was at the station when I felt the ground shaking. I thought it must be a train but there was nothing moving. Later that day on the local TV news I discovered that there had been a fairly strong quake along the coast centered on Monaco. So a 1 for me.

David | 30.01.23 - 8:58 a.m. | #

I flew into Santiago, Chile on 17 September 2015, the day after the 8.3 magnitude quake that caused significant damage in the coastal city of Illapel. A few days later my friend and I were enjoying lunch at the Domita wine estate in the Casablanca valley when an aftershock occurred, with chandeliers swinging and the plate glass of the picture windows flexing back and forth. Not being versed in earthquake etiquette, we watched to see how our fellow diners, presumeably locals, reacted - we didn't know whether to drop everything and run out screaming or climb under the table - but after a few seconds pause they carried on eating as if nothing was happening. The quake on the 15th and the subsequent aftershocks originated offshore from the Coquimbo region of Chile and the LastQuake app (free) records seismic events there on a weekly or sometimes, even daily basis... there was a 3.3 magnitude tremor 41 minutes ago.

Richard | 30.01.23 - 9:09 a.m. | #

Like you, I experienced one earthquake in the small hours one morning, about 20 years ago I think. I learned later the epicentre was about 100 miles away in the west Midlands.

timbo | 30.01.23 - 9:13 a.m. | #

1 for a tornado in Greece over Naxos.

Dave B | 30.01.23 - 9:30 a.m. | #

Staying at my cousin's in LA in about 1999. Middle of the night. we followed the "drill", in doorways, under tables etc. A bit frightening, lasted about 30 seconds, ornaments toppled, but no damage. Made the TV news, but nobody seriously injured or died.
During the day in Manchester in 2005ish. A noticable rumble. Made the TV news!!

MikeK | 30.01.23 - 10:11 a.m. | #

The 2008 earthquake woke me up. I made an incorrect assumption that it was a neighbour's unbalanced washing machine and went back to sleep!

Adam | 30.01.23 - 10:26 a.m. | #

Two in Tokyo, maybe one in Izmir.
0 for the rest

In a hotel room in a tall tower for both occasions in Tokyo, both minor but went to stand under the lintel of the door to the room, which is think is the recommendation.

MilesT | 30.01.23 - 10:29 a.m. | #

Plenty of earthquakes fairly close around me where I lived for many years in western America, but somehow I managed to miss experiencing all of them!

Cornish Cockney | 30.01.23 - 11:01 a.m. | #

I was close to the epicentre of the W Midlands earthquake in the early 2000s. It woke us up in the early hours. Our wardrobe doors were opening and banging shut, as though a mad poltergeist was at work. The whole house was shaking. We had to wait for radio news bulletins the next morning to find out what it was.

Wendy | 30.01.23 - 11:37 a.m. | #

I lived in Japan for a while, so experienced earthquakes: as I worked in chemical laboratory, part of the drill if there was a quake at night was to rush around checking that nothing had caught fire.

Later, living in China, I was in a frankly rather boring meeting in Quanzhou, and thought I felt that familiar feeling again, but when I asked afterwards none of my work colleagues had noticed it. It turned out to have been an earthquake that morning ... in Taiwan.

MartinG | 30.01.23 - 11:43 a.m. | #

Aged 14 at the time, and just 20 or so miles from the epicentre, the Market Rasen earthquake woke me up and TERRIFIED me, I thought our house was going to collapse. It's the strangest thing I have ever experienced - it felt like the shaking would never end (I now know it was only about 10 seconds or so)

FlyingFish93 | 30.01.23 - 12:42 p.m. | #

My one earthquake was also the 2008 one. I remember being surprised and disappointed in my housemate's ambivalence. When I asked if he'd felt the shaking he just said 'yes, it's an earthquake' and went back to bed as if it was a totally normal thing to have happened.

Anders | 30.01.23 - 2:03 p.m. | #

A zero, but I was woken by the explosion at Buncefield, around 16 miles away. December 2005.

Lucy Garden | 30.01.23 - 4:20 p.m. | #

I too was though awoken by the Buncefield explosion. But that doesn't count.

Frank F | 30.01.23 - 4:37 p.m. | #

2 points for earthquake in Peshawar in Pakistan some years ago. In modern hotel and woke to the sensation of the bed, and indeed the whole room, gently wobbling. Went into bathroom as advised for maximum protection, leaving door ajar so would not be trapped. Did NOT go outside as things can fall on you. Quake subsided after a few minutes and only the next morning did we see destruction all around of less well built houses and shops.

ActonMan | 30.01.23 - 5:35 p.m. | #

My earthquake experiance was in Athens in I think 1981. I remember being taken by friends to a church service which I was not very keen on attending so when the building started shaking and everyone had to leave I was pleased as the service was cancelled

John | 30.01.23 - 5:55 p.m. | #

2011 Virginia earthquake (5.8) felt in my office in Washington, DC. Our building had metal wall studs so when the quake rolled through the noise and vibration was deafening. Having experienced a small quake in CA some years earlier, it seemed instinctual to dive under my desk. Work sent us home so a structural engineer could check the building. When I got home (50 miles south of DC), items had fallen off the walls, the chimney had swayed (DH witnessed when he ran out of his home office) so there was debris on the mantel and all the drawers in the kitchen, our offices and bedrooms had come open.

Mary | 30.01.23 - 5:59 p.m. | #

I'm a zero on everything, but I'm slightly surprised no one has mentioned the Folkestone/Hythe earthquake of 2007. It was only a 4.3, but it was big news in Kent and may have been felt in parts of London.

DavidC | 30.01.23 - 6:47 p.m. | #

On vacation in Acapulco in about 1977, a 5.6 initial tremor followed by days of aftershocks. Small tremor in Toronto in the early 1980s that collapsed part of the roof at the local mall. Small quake while on a business trip to Vancouver in the 1990s. Quake near 6 on the scale in Tokyo around 2005. Looking at those dates, I fear I may be overdue for another one!

James Webber | 30.01.23 - 6:58 p.m. | #

I was in university halls for the 2008 earthquake, which probably explains why my initial assumption was that it must be a couple 'getting to know each other' in a next door room. Obviously when a car alarm went off down the street I had to reconsider...

Chris | 30.01.23 - 7:40 p.m. | #

The Dudley earthquake of about 20 years ago is the only one I’ve felt.

Sir Frederick Bosch | 30.01.23 - 9:14 p.m. | #

Earthquake @0058h, 27th February, 2008, at Epping. Sounded like a tube train approaching in the tunnel. Unusual sensations of gentle movement as the wave passed with sound subsiding quickly. Hanging lights lift swinging.

GB | Homepage | 30.01.23 - 9:30 p.m. | #

Definitely a two for an earthquake in Chile in Nov 2019. The room shook for over 30 seconds. It being Chile and a well built building meant there was no panic or damage, but it was still def an earthquake.

Robert Butlin | 30.01.23 - 10:28 p.m. | #

I'm told that if you live in a country where building standards are lax but earthquakes are infrequent, your reaction may not be "oh, it's an earthquake" so much as "the building's collapsing, are we all going to die?"

BWB | 31.01.23 - 10:50 a.m. | #

Only the simulated experience at the Science Museum some years ago, I won't count that.

Strabismus | 31.01.23 - 1:11 p.m. | #

A small earth tremor in San Francisco, Easter 1990, and a couple of earth tremors whilst in the monitoring station on Etna in 2010 - so there's my volcano point too.

Graham | 31.01.23 - 9:45 p.m. | #

1 for the Leighton Buzzard earthquake in 2020. Sitting in an office in Milton Keynes and felt like a large vehicle had hit the building which sort of rocked on its foundations.

Quizzical Eyebrow | Homepage | 01.02.23 - 12:16 a.m. | #

Proper earthquakes 1 - Boxing Day 2004, I was in northern Malaysia

Crap earthquakes 1 - December 2019, Somerset. A minor jolt, like if someone slams a door in an old wood floored house

Herned | 03.02.23 - 9:33 p.m. | #











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