Earthquakes Rattle Residents of Magnet Cove
It just shakes my windows every time it happens and scares us to death. My poor dogs about had a heart attack. I've lived here 40 years and never felt an earthquake. I don't ever remember an earthquake. —Joyce Dyer, Magnet Cove resident
November 26, 2008
By Mark Bivens, Editor
Malvern Daily Record, Arkansas
Mary Lou Wallis isn't much different from a lot of people in the Magnet Cove area. She's concerned - maybe even a little worried about the recent rash of earthquakes.
“It makes you apprehensive,” Wallis said of November's earthquakes. “My windows rattle - it's frightening. We're so close to the [Baroid] pits and Remmel Dam. A lot of people on Smoke Ridge Road are concerned.”
Paxton Penny, a longtime resident of the Magnet Cove area, has felt the tremors.
“It shakes and sounds like an explosion” Penny said. “It's like the whole house rattles. One of my little sister's friends started crying.”
Eva Wells had lived in the Magnet Cove area over 80 years and has never felt an earthquake there.
“I was watching the news and felt something like it came of the floor,” Wells said. “It was like the ground coming through the floor.”
Joyce Dyer and her husband, Milton, live on Rubin Lane.
“It just shakes my windows every time it happens and scares us to death,” Joyce Dyer said. “My poor dogs about had a heart attack. I've lived her 40 years and never felt an earthquake. I don't ever remember an earthquake.”
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HOLLY NOTE: As a reminder, though USGS maps label an event "Last Day", it may be as recent as 1 hour + 1 minute ago. Events designated as "Last Week" may have occurred as recently as 61 minutes ago. This "lump sum" dating often gives an inaccurate picture of the exact time earthquakes strike - always pushing the date back. |
Milton Dyer, Joyce said, once said 'I'm packing and moving south' after feeling one of the earthquakes while watching TV.
Patricia Beasley lives on Smoke Ridge Road.
“The noise,” Beasley remembers the most about the earthquakes. “The house, everything just shook. I was born on this hilltop 65 years ago. Never, never, in all my life have I felt anything like this.”
Beasley said a lot of her neighbors have the same thoughts she does.
“We wonder what's going on,” Beasley said. “People want to know more about this. We haven't had this before. My grandparents homesteaded here. It's [our] soil. It's [our] life here. I would never consider moving. No.”
Beasley said the earthquakes result in a rash of telephone calls among friends and family checking on each other.
“They say, 'y'all still in one piece over there?'” Beasley said.
It's not just the number of recent earthquakes that have Beasley concerned.
“This started the first day of November - why?” Beasley asked. “We've seen two tornadoes. That's unusual. Damage in Hot Spring County with so many trees down. That's just different. What are we headed for?”
The U.S. Geological Survey indicates an earthquake with a preliminary magnitude of 2.3 happened just before 6:30 p.m. Saturday about six miles northeast of Hot Springs Village.
A quake of magnitude 2.5 to 3 is the smallest generally felt by people.
Nov. 2 an earthquake was reported three miles northeast of Rockport with a magnitude of 2.7. No damage was reported.
Nov. 10 an earthquake registering a magnitude of 2.0 was recorded three miles northeast of Rockport.
Nov. 21 an earthquake 13 miles northeast of Hot Springs Village registered 2.6.
Earthquakes in a similar location were reported Saturday and Sunday, registering 2.3.
The largest recorded earthquake in the United States was a magnitude 9.2 that struck Prince William Sound, Alaska, on Good Friday, March 28, 1964.
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