Eastern earthquakes, explosions, truck crashes, and Morris dancing

Charles Scharnberger's comment on the last post was excellent. It is also interesting, but reasonable, how often our relatively infrequent eastern earthquakes are confused with explosions and truck crashes. Eastern quakes are usually small, so the shaking is more like a short pulse of energy, and there is sometimes an audible sound which probably makes people think of those other possibilities.

There is an interesting collection of reactions to the New Jersey earthquake in the story:

Morris County earthquake shakes residents, spares property
by Kristen Alloway/The Star-Ledger
Tuesday February 03, 2009, 6:50 PM

"Many who heard a boom and felt the ground shake thought their furnace had blown up. Others feared a truck or plane had crashed. Still others surmised there had been an explosion at Picatinny Arsenal, an Army base in Morris County that tests weapons."

Read the full story here.

And since we are in Morris County, does anyone else regret the demise of English Morris dancing? I used to do Scottish country dancing, and still contra dance once in a while, so I'm hoping this earthquake might spur Morris County citizens into a St. Vitus-like revival of Morris dancing.

Check out the trailer from the new movie Morris: A Life with Bells On.