We had a small earthquake last night..
Quake rattles Dillon-Butte region
Damage minor
By the Standard Staff - 07/26/2005
Quake was 13 miles northwest of Dillon
An earthquake measuring a magnitude 5.6 struck southwestern Montana shortly after 10 p.m. Monday, rattling windows, nerves and buildings, but there were no immediate reports of any serious damage or injuries.
The U.S. Geological Survey said the earthquake was centered about 13 miles northwest of Dillon, but residents across a wide swath of Montana, Idaho and Washington reported feeling the temblor at about 10:10 p.m. Reports came in from as far away as Great Falls, more than 200 miles to the north, and Billings, 250 miles to the east. Some residents reported two distinct tremors, several seconds apart, lasting about eight to 10 seconds in all.
In Butte, on the second floor of The Montana Standard building, 25 W. Granite St., newsroom personnel felt the building shake for 25 seconds — one employee timed the shaking from when it first started.
In Dillon, Beaverhead County Commissioner Mike McGinley said there were scattered reports of broken glass and other minor damage around town, but nothing significant.
‘‘We've got fire and ambulance personnel standing by'' just in case, he said Monday night.
McGinley told The Montana Standard that the Clark Canyon Reservoir and dam are OK after being checked. His understanding is that the quake's epicenter was in the area of Lake Agnes and Brownes Lake — popular fishing lakes — in the Pioneer Mountains. He also said bridges in the area were checked, and no damage reported.
"It's a moderate earthquake," said Robert Smith, a professor geophysics at the University of Utah, who also heads the university's earthquake monitoring of the Yellowstone National Park region.
He said Tuesday night's quake was "a lot smaller" than the 1959 Hebgen Lake earthquake, which measured 7.3 on the Richter Scale, according to the University of Utah, and caused 28 deaths.
Initial reports from the USGS said Tuesday's quake occurred about 25 miles underground, but the USGS later said the quake was at a much more shallow depth — only about 3 miles below the surface.
Bud Revious, the deputy response coordinator for the state Disaster and Emergency Services office in Helena, said officials there were busy monitoring the state's scattered wildfires when the office shook.
‘‘We thought maybe we were having one of those microbursts like we had a couple weeks ago, but we looked around and there was no wind,'' he said.
Brenda Robertson, a bartender at Fetty's in Wisdom, said people in the bar heard "a big huge boom ... and everyone kind of froze." She said it sounded "like a semi going through the building." While no damage was caused, she said the big mirror behind the bar rattled intensely.
Down the road at the H Bar J bar in Wise River, owner and bartender Charlie Beck said they didn't feel much. In fact, they didn't know exactly what happened until someone called the bar from Seeley Lake.
"We're fine," Beck said. "It shook our beer up, but it's settling down." t On the Net: U.S. Geological Survey's Earthquake Hazard Program http://earthquake.usgs.gov/ Editor's note: This report was compiled from reporting by The Associated Press and Montana Standard staff.
http://www.montanastandard.com/artic...jchdjchgjd.txt
it was for only 30 seconds, shocking the last time we had a earthquake, I was in the 6th grade..
