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China quake rattles well in Virginia

The magnitude 7.9 earthquake that rocked much of China today, killing thousands, also sent tremors through the earth that caused water levels in a USGS monitoring well in Christiansburg, Va. to slosh more than a foot.

Here's the trace on the water level. (The smaller, wave-like variations before and after the big spike are caused by tidal forces in the ground - the action of lunar gravity on the Earth's crust as the planet spins.)

USGS

About the bloggers

Chris Emery's interest in science stems from an afterschool job cleaning grease spots off a gas station parking lot. His motto: there's nothing like scrubbing a grease spot to get you thinking about the nature of the universe. He joined The Sun in 2006 and covers science, medicine and technology.

Dennis O'Brien has an abiding interest in the natural world and is constantly amazed at how complicated the simple things in life can be. He's been a reporter at The Sun since 1987 and has been writing about science for five years.

Frank Roylance is the old coot on this blog. He joined The Evening Sun in 1980 and The Sun in 1993. He covers science for the paper, and writes the paper's Weather Blog and Weather Page commentary. He's been married since Hector was a pup, with two grown kids who also think science is cool.

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