Recently there was a strong earthquake in the Philippines, near the epicenter of the quake there was substantial damage, but in the outlying areas there was little or no damage. The  intensity  was  from 4.0 to 6.9 in different areas, the  Island  of  Negros  received the worst of it, and  with 42  people  killed.

People  did panic mostly because  someone  stirred  them up one incident  I heard  of, was that some  guys on  a motorcycle rode  through the market at  Cebu City yelling  “tsunami is coming” ,  ok, so tell me  what  would  you  do stand  there  until your  feet  got  wet or head for higher ground,  most  people  chose  to head for higher ground, but  it  was  a farce and  the  water never came. But the people felt good for having played it safe.

I was  in  Gaisano Metro in Mandaue City having  coffee , and it  felt like I was  in a rocking  chair, nice and  gentle. Now I can understand why and how people get trampled and killed in a panic situation. I had  never seen anything  like  it before, I have  felt  earthquakes  before, but  never in a populated area, like in Grass Valley California where I lived for  many  years, we  had  shakes  but  there  was  no people  to  panic  and  run.

That is a big  grocery store and department  store, there  was a lot  of people  in there shopping, but  I m here to tell you  that  place  was  empty in about  two minutes.  Had anyone fallen down the others would have just walked over them. What a feeling, down deep it’s kind of eerie knowing what could happen.

My  wife  was up on the 3rd  floor trying  to come down, she  said  the elevator car was hitting  the  sides  of  the  shaft as  it  descended, can you imagine. Needless to say she was scared, but she got over it soon.

Then also there were fires to contend with, like they usually happen from carelessness or inconsideration. It has been an exciting week here I the Philippines.