By Holly Deyo

standeyo.com

Tornadoes twist off the charts.

Earthquakes rocket up.

Floods soak millions.

Deepening drought sucks life from rivers, reservoirs, crops and livestock.

Sea levels rise, along with the number of blistering Summer heat waves and record-breaking snowfalls.

2005 brought one of the worst-ever hurricane seasons.

Wildfires flare in the middle of Winter in America's South and Canada after coming off history's second worst fire season.

And the Sun... that unknown factor... The door has barely opened to Solar Cycle 24 which is to peak around 2012. How will it affect these growing problems...

Add to this a shaky, antiquated power grid we depend on to cool us from savage heat, warm us in brutal freezes and to keep life as normal as possible. Two massive power failures in three months point to its frailty. Money needed to fix many critical infrastructure problems is sent out of country or flicked away by a flagging economy. Increasingly emergency preparedness is left to the individual because government doesn't have the $$ or manpower, and sometimes not the competence, to get the job done.

Yet, when we should be getting out of harm's way, and finding a safe place, more people are moving right into disaster target zones. You can almost hear Clint ask, "Well, do you feel lucky?"

http://standeyo.com/NEWS/08_Earth_Changes/080228.natl.diz.up.html

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Britain Rocked by Biggest Earthquake in 25 Years

Damage bill runs into millions

February 27, 2008

UK Daily Mail

England has been rocked by the biggest earthquake to hit the country in 25 years - and the cost of damage to homes and properties is expected to be a staggering £10million.

The quake, measuring 5.2 on the Richter scale, hit at 1am this morning and the tremors were strong enough to wake even deep sleepers.

David Bates narrowly escaped death when a chimney smashed through the roof of his terraced home and crashed into his bedroom as he watched TV in bed.

He was woken in his attic bedroom, by falling masonry as the brick chimney stack was dislodged by the force of the ten second shaking.

www.standeyo.com/NEWS/08_Earth_Changes/080228.UK.5.2.EQ.html

Photo: Shocked: Grimsby resident Ruth Starr, 22, was woken by the earthquake and horrified to discover the destruction. Read more...

* 'I was crushed in my bed by a falling chimney' says teenage earthquake victim

Speaking from his hospital bed, David, 19, said: "Everything started shaking and I don't know why, but I knew it was an earthquake.

"Then all of a sudden it all went dark and there was a noise like smashing plates as something came crashing through the ceiling. Then this big piece of concrete fell on me and landed on my hips."

David is in hospital with a broken pelvis.

Photo: Terrifying: David Bates was almost killed when the chimney crashed into his bedroom

Photo: Shock: Kleber Afonso in the attic of his house next door to the one where David Bates was injured in Wombwell, Barnsley

The Association of British Insurers said today that the cost of damage to homes and property is likely to be in excess of £10million.

People as far apart as Yorkshire, Manchester, Merseyside, Lincolnshire, Oxfordshire, Gloucestershire, Wiltshire and London said they felt the tremor.

Many homes and businesses across the country were also damaged by the tremor.

The shudders were felt by MPs during a late-night sitting at the House of Commons and a man at Canary Wharf thought "a bomb had gone off".

Emergency services were flooded with calls from people across the UK, many of whom had woken up to find their home shaking.

The quake's epicentre was near Market Rasen, in Lincolnshire. The Reverend Michael Cartwright said a stone cross had fallen from St Thomas's Church, which is in the town, and hit part of the building's roof, dislodging tiles, before smashing on the ground.

Lee Rushworth, 29, from Hartlepool, was woken up when the tremor made his sofa shake against the bedroom wall of his ground floor flat.

He said: "I thought someone was banging on the wall behind me but there was no-one there."

Today's quake is the largest since 1984 when an earthquake measuring 5.4 on the Richter scale shook the Lleyn Peninsula of north Wales and was widely felt across England and Wales.

Sylvia Tidy-Harris, from Ellistown, Leicestershire said: "It was like a big juggernaut was coming down the road. It was very loud and the whole house shook."

Sarah Milligan, from Stockport, is four months' pregnant and was thrown to the floor by the tremor.

She said: "The whole house was shaking so I stood up off the sofa trying to see what happened. My legs gave way.

"I've had to go to hospital to make sure the baby is okay."

Photo: Damage: Firemen secure toppled chimney stacks on houses in Grimsby following this morning's earthquake

Jamie Rolls, 38, of Colchester, said: "It was the strangest thing I've ever felt.

"The whole room was moving and I looked down to a glass of Coke on the table and it started bubbling up. The whole tremor lasted about 20 seconds in two separate waves."

Chris Wallwork, 58, was sitting at his computer in the upstairs study of his 18th-century cottage in Eaton Bray near Dunstable, Beds, when he felt it begin to sway. "It was really weird. I felt the cottage sway very slowly three or four times."

Kultaran Singh, from Derby, said: "I was woken up in the middle of deep sleep. I thought I was going to slide off the bed, which was shaking along with the walls and all the furniture.

"I thought at first that part of my house had collapsed. But the whole thing only lasted about five minutes, and I couldn't believe there was no damage given how strong the tremor felt."

Graph: Earthquake: The UK was rocked by the quake which hit 5.2 on the Richter scale

Bernard Wakefield-Heath, 49, of Stroud, in Gloucestershire, said the tremor shook his block of flats.

Mr Wakefield-Heath, a business consultant, said: "I live in the middle section and I could feel everything around me move, shaking quite considerably.

"It lasted about 10 to 15 seconds at least.

"I remember the quake a few years ago and when you feel something like that, you don't forget it."

Photo: Smashed: A car's window is hit by falling debris in Hull

John Jenkin, from Bourne in Lincolnshire, was woken by the tremors and said that objects had fallen from shelves.

He said: "I was woken up. It was hell."

A spokesman for The Met Office said: "We have been getting calls from all over the country. It appears to have affected all of England."

Photo: Clearing up: A homeowner in Hull sweeps up after brickwork was brought tumbling down

The British Geological Survey (BGS) initially gave the magnitude for the 12.56am earthquake as 5.3 on the Richter scale but has now said it was closer to 5.2.

It said the centre was 8km east of Market Rasen, Lincolnshire, and 22km south west of Grimsby.

Seismologist Dr Brian Baptie of the BGS said: "This is a significant earthquake for the UK and will have been widely felt across England and Wales."

The BGS said it records around 200 earthquakes in the UK each year - an eighth of which are able to be felt by residents.

It said earthquakes of this size occur in the mainland UK around every 30 years but are more common in offshore areas.

Buildings are deemed to be at risk from earthquakes above 5 on the Richter Scale, according to the Environment Agency.

Last April, more than 70 homes were cordoned off near Folkestone in Kent following a tremor of 4.3 at around 8.20am. the biggest earthquake to hit Britain in five years.

The largest earthquake recorded in the UK was about 75 miles north-east of Great Yarmouth in the North Sea on 7 June, 1931. It measured 6.1 and was felt across Britain, in eastern Ireland, Belgium, the Netherlands, and parts of Germany, France, Norway and Denmark.

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