Earthquake in LA in 1994

Recently, the earthquake occurred in Japan. I also experienced the earthquake that I never forget. It is a Northridge earthquake that occurred on January 17 that is Martin Luther King’s birthday.  (Earthquake in LA) When I was child, I had lived in Northridge area in LA with my family.

That day, I was sleeping as usual in my room. And then, AM4:30, the earthquake occurred suddenly. The earthquake attacked our town in power of magnitude 6.7. Our house shook intensely, and a lot of furniture and things fell. All of my family were surprised by the vibration of the earthquake and woke up.　 My father came to my room at once and I was taken to the safe place. And, we worried about whether our family's safety each other in a pitch-dark house due to the power failure. Because of the earthquake, a lot of something was littered about the floor in my house of the dark, I felt uneasy even to walk a house I have grown fond of. And my families gathered in one room, and burn a wax candle because of a power failure, and feelings were made to settle down only a little with the light. And then, we ascertained the situation on the radio. All of my family is safety. However, the dead due to this earthquake were about 70 people, and had about as many as 9000 injured persons. Even if my family is safety, I was very shocked when I heard the fact. But it is all I can do to defend my life and my family's life then. Everyone was desperate to defend own life. After it had become impossible to use electricity and water, I really realized that water and electricity are very important essential things. After that, I came to use water and electricity importantly.

And, the Santa Monica freeway that connects downtown of LA and volleyball district called the commuting traffic of U.S. 1 collapsed due to the earthquake, and it had an influence big as for the citizens' lives after the earthquake. The damage total due to not only that but also this earthquake became 25 billion dollars.

I was scared by earthquake. However, I was also very scared by the secondary disaster of a fire etc due to the earthquake.

I had been thought that human is excellent, because human can make large and substantial building, car that moves fast and airplane that flies over the sky. But I think that no one can match the power of nature.

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