Dang, mother nature wasn't messing around today.
CNN

The email i got says

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I was just sitting here contemplating the immortal words of Socrates who said, "I drank what?"

"Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that, in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot." --Carl Sagan "Pale Blue Dot"

The current story says:

A magnitude 7.5 earthquake struck off the coast of central Peru on Wednesday evening, the U.S. Geological Survey said.

The USGS initially reported three earthquakes, but later revised those reports, blaming a a [sic] computer glitch

As long as there isn't a serious tsunami, and if it isn't too close to land, that shouldn't be a big issue. A 7.5 in a population center would be another matter.

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Yea I'm not sure why the initial news alert says 3 quakes. All the stories, including CNN Headline news say 1 quake.

Edit: Oh nevermind, I missed the middle part of your post explaining

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I was just sitting here contemplating the immortal words of Socrates who said, "I drank what?"

"Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that, in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot." --Carl Sagan "Pale Blue Dot"

USGS Data: 8.0 near the coast of central Peru

Maps

List

An 8.0 followed by lots of 5-plus

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0 1 1 0 1 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 1 1 0 1 0 0 1 0 1 1 0 0 1 1 0 1 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 1 1 0 0 1 1 0 1 0 0 1 0 1 1 0 1 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 1 1 0 ...

One story quoted a survivor as saying the quake just went on and on. I'm sure a 7.9 would seem like it was never going to end.

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"I'm as accurate as any psychic. And I'm a cartoon!" -- Squidward

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New info from CNN

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I was just sitting here contemplating the immortal words of Socrates who said, "I drank what?"

"Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that, in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot." --Carl Sagan "Pale Blue Dot"

Some earthquakes are also longer than others, which is, so far as I know, only partially dependent on magnitude.

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"You can't erase icing."

"I can't believe it doesn't work! I found it on the internet, man!"

Horrible, isn't it.

Eight.

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In light of your "lofty goal", this comment makes more sense to me now lol. I was wondering what the "Eight" meant, since the magnitude of the quake is 8.

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I was just sitting here contemplating the immortal words of Socrates who said, "I drank what?"

"Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that, in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot." --Carl Sagan "Pale Blue Dot"

Reminds me of a couple of bridges that collapsed recently, one in the US, and another in China...