Besides the weather, there aren't
many things in our lives that result
in a shared experience for hundreds
of thousands of Western New Yorkers.
But this morning's earthquake
is an exception.
Unless you slip through it or you're in
the Southern Tier may be too far away,
you likely felt the 3.8 magnitude quake.
It happened at precisely 6:15 this morning,
centered in a neighborhood
that sits along Buffalo Creek,
just to the east of the 90 in West Seneca.
Right by the 400 interchange,
it was about 2 miles under
the Earth's surface.
And while the epicenter
wasn't in that specific spot,
it certainly while the epicenter was there,
it caused lots of concern all
over the region stretching from
Niagara Falls to the South towns,
also our eastern counties.
This is obviously rare.
So what to make of it?
Patrick Hammer is our chief
meteorologist and he's joining us
tonight from our Hamburg Bureau,
AKA his backyard.
Because if you watch Daybreak
today you know that Patrick is from
California knows a thing or two
about these types of of earthquakes.
Patrick,
we appreciate you braving the cold here.
What did you make as you felt this
and help us understand what we're
learning tonight about this earthquake?
Michael, I gotta tell you, it was.
The strangest thing,
like so many people at home,
we were broadcasting on the
air and my initial thought was.
A plane crashed, something hit the studio,
and explosion across Delaware happened.
Melissa Holmes, we went to commercial break,
she goes, was was that an earthquake?
And my initial reaction was was no,
it that was an explosion.
That's not what an earthquake feels like.
Umm. And then 10 seconds later.
I got a text from my daughter here in
Hamburg and she said, dad, did you hear that?
Did you feel that?
And that's when I knew, OK, well,
I'm in downtown and she felt it in Hamburg.
What else could it be that had to have been?
An earthquake.
And I got to tell you,
it felt different.
Then the kind of earthquakes that I
experienced growing up in California.
So, Patrick, I know, I know you
made some graphics for us earlier.
Walk us through that including,
you know, where the epicenter
was for this earthquake and then
what we know about, you know,
the fault line that is here and then
some of the history behind all this.
Yeah. So, OK, so this earthquake had
its epicenter in, as we can show you
graphically in West Seneca and as a 3.8.
Now, earthquakes happen along fault lines
where Earth's plates either rub against
each other or ride up and over each other,
called either strike slip or,
you know, faults or, you know,
faults that just kind of
slide up against each other.
We do have a false.
You had called the Claridon Lyndon
Fault system, which runs from Lake
Ontario down through Orleans,
Genesee and Wyoming into Allegheny counties,
and this earthquake was
probably associated with that.
And we have a historical.
You know, experience with earthquakes
associated with that fault system.
In fact, we've plotted where earthquakes have
happened associated with that fault system.
A lot of those have been in Wyoming
County and in Erie County as well.
There's a history of them and
some of them have been in the 3.0
to 4.0 or a little bit larger.
In fact, we have a list of some of the
top four earthquakes that have happened.
And I got to tell you this,
3.8 is the largest.
Earthquake, we have felt here in 56 years.
That's a long time.
You've got to go back to 1923.
There was a 4.8 in Attica. OK.
And then we have a couple of others,
most notably 2 that were just
above a 4.0 in the 1960s. OK.
And then you come to this one,
which was a 3.8.
So they're infrequent.
They don't happen.
Very often earthquakes tend to roll.
They can last 30 to 40 seconds,
maybe up to a minute.
This one was like an explosion,
likely because it was shallow,
only a third three kilometers down.
They often like the one in Turkey,
the Loma Prieta in San Francisco,
the Northridge.
Those happen at 10 to 15 kilometers down.
The fact that this was shallow,
which is probably why it sounded
and felt like a short explosion.
Needless to say,
even though it wasn't really that
large in a national perspective,
it certainly rattled a lot of nerves.
Yeah. And Patrick, I think a
lot of people are wondering,
as we look at that history and the fact
that this is the strongest earthquake
in Western New York in in 50 years,
what to make of that history?
I mean, it is, I guess it's just the case,
right, that any earthquake can
happen anywhere and maybe we
shouldn't necessarily be surprised.
Yeah, Michael, I I'm not sure if I I
quite heard you, but the fact is, yeah,
earthquakes happen in many areas where.
Plates line up against one another.
The Pacific Rim is is a notable place,
but they also can happen in the
center part of the country.
Missouri is a hotspot.
Elise showed you earlier.
There was one in Texas.
Today down in the Carolinas, Virginia,
those are places that have earthquakes.
But of course,
the devastating news today, of course,
is what's been happening overseas in Turkey,
where that earthquake is on the
magnitude of 10,000 times stronger.
And the one we felt here today
and the results of course is over
3000 deaths and probably a death
toll that's likely to climb.
Yeah, we've all talked about how, you know,
audit is to be discussing the fact
that we have this very small earthquake
happening in Western New York today,
nowhere near the damage
that we're seeing you know,
overseas as they're all coping with that.
Patrick before I let you go,
what are you looking forward to
learning as you know we hear from
more experts in in terms of you know.
What they're able to tell us
about this earthquake, what,
what caused and all of that.
What are you gonna be following
in the in the coming day or so?
Well, what am I going to be following
in terms of what's coming next?
Is that what you're saying?
Not necessarily like if there's going to
be another earthquake as a result of this,
some type of aftershock,
but what information would you like
to to gather in terms of or or is
there anything more that we do learn?
You know, I'm just thinking as
we talk to these experts who know
all of this stuff so well,
what questions do you have
that are still unanswered?
You know, I I guess I kind
of like to understand.
You know, this this false system,
I mean we are here, you know,
in New York State, which is,
you know, not known to be.
I mean it's kind of geologically active.
We don't have a major fault
system that runs through here.
I mean we've got this one
that I mentioned earlier.
I'm just kind of curious
what caused this one?
Was it just like Doctor
Bohan mentioned earlier?
Was it just happenstance?
Was it just kind of a a,
a random act, a random occurrence?
I I got to believe it was I I.
Have to believe that it was nature
just being Mother Nature and.
I don't know.
I just found it fascinating that it
happened to occur on a day where
we're having a major earthquake
at another part of the country,
of another part of the world.
I think it was a I believe
it was a a coincidence.
You do have a dynamic process
where other earthquakes can cause
other earthquakes to to happen.
They usually are of a closer proximity,
but I'd like to see if possibly there
was a relationship between the two.
That's what I would like to learn.
Peter Camera joining us
from the backyard there.
Patrick, we appreciate it.
We were hoping to speak with the USGS.
I'm unfortunately we're having
problems with that connection so
we can't bring you that interview.
But as Patrick mentioned,
there are certainly a lot
of questions that remain.
Our coverage will continue on all
of this coming up at 6:00 o'clock.
We will hear from a seismologist
and continue to try to understand
why this happened this morning and
also seeing if there is any damage.