BIRTHPAINS!!!???

THIS MORNING - 6/28:  6.7 EQ Alaska; 4.5 EQ Illinois

Powerful earthquake jolts southeast Alaska, no major
damage reported
FROM:
http://www.kgw.com/sharedcontent/APStories/stories/D83FV4SO2.html

Powerful earthquake jolts southeast Alaska, no major
damage reported 06/28/2004 Associated Press A powerful
earthquake with a preliminary magnitude of 7.0 jolted residents
of the southern Alaska panhandle out of their sleep early Monday,
but no significant damage was reported, scientists said. The
quake occurred at 1:50 a.m. Alaska time and was centered
beneath the ocean about 70 miles northwest of Dixon Entrance,
the waters between the southern end of the panhandle and the
Queen Charlotte Islands of British Columbia, or about 60 miles
southwest of Craig, said Bill Knight, a scientist at the Alaska
Tsunami Warning Center. The jolt, capable of severe damage
had it occurred near populated areas on land, did not generate
a tsunami or seismic sea wage, Knight said. The observatory
received numerous calls from people who felt the quake in Craig
and Petersburg but no reports of significant damage, "just items
falling off the shelves," Knight said.
 

Magnitude 4.5 earthquake shakes Midwest
Copyright © 2004 Nando Media
Copyright © 2004 AP Online
By F.N. D'ALESSIO, Associated Press

FROM:
http://www.nbc5.com/news/3467627/detail.html
CHICAGO (June 28, 3:27 am ADT) - A brief earthquake
struck the Midwest early Monday, rattling windows and
awakening sleeping residents from Wisconsin south to
Missouri and from Indiana west to Iowa.No injuries were
reported from the quake, which occurred about 1:11 a.m.
CDT.Brian Lassige, a geophysicist with the U.S. Geological
Survey in Colorado, said the quake was magnitude 4.5,
and its epicenter was about eight miles northwest of
Ottawa in northern Illinois, close to the small village of
Troy Grove. The rural area is about 70 miles west of
Chicago.Initial reports indicated no major damage from
the temblor, although police agencies and radio stations
within the quake area were inundated with telephone calls.
"It was mayhem around here for a while," said Pattie Burke,
a dispatcher for the Ottawa Police. "We had more than
200 calls from residents in a short period of time, all of
them wanting to know what had happened. A lot of them
seemed to think a truck had crashed into their house.
"Here in the station, it felt like an aircraft was about to
crash right here."The quake was felt at three nuclear
power plants in Illinois: Quad Cities, LaSalle and Dresden.
Craig Nesbit, a spokesman for the Exelon Corp., which owns
the three generating stations, said the Nuclear Regulatory
Commission declared an "unusual alert" for all of them,
although there appeared to be no damage."All of them
were operating 100 percent, and no problems were
reported, but we did a check of all safety systems,"
Nesbit said.Nesbit said the three stations supply electrical
power for several million Illinois residents.Reports of the
shaking came from at least as far east as Valparaiso, Ind.,
and as far west as the Quad Cities, and from Wisconsin
in the north to the St. Louis area in the south.Gary
Spaulding of Marseilles, Ill., said he was relaxing in his
mobile home when the quake struck."It was like somebody
shot off dynamite," said Spaulding, who added that his
cat leaped out of his lap and would still not come near
him two hours later. "I thought maybe a tree hit my trailer.
"Joe Knapp of Delafield, Wis., just west of Milwaukee, said
he was asleep and awoke when the bed began shaking.
"Everything was just rolling back and forth," Knapp said.