Another Quake at Coalinga--Locals Nervously Shrug It Off

When the earth began to rumble late Friday night in the Central California farm town of Coalinga, Maria Bazan did not budge from her bed. Her father did not even wake up.

“There is no use running out,” Bazan, who works at Coalinga District Hospital, said Saturday. “With time, you learn not to run and panic.”

Bazan and many of the 7,800 people who live in the Fresno County town do not mind admitting that they are a bit cocky when it comes to earthquakes. They say they have seen it all.

When the earth heaved there in 1983, 47 people were injured, much of the downtown was leveled, and 300 apartments and homes--including the Bazans’--were destroyed or damaged. Hundreds of aftershocks followed the quake, which measured 6.7 on the Richter scale and caused $31-million in damages.

Friday night’s quake, in comparison, was a sleeper, residents said. It set off burglar alarms, broke some water pipes, shattered several windows and, among other things, sent jars of peanuts crashing to the floor at the local Thrifty drugstore.

One woman, evidently less complacent about the shaking earth than many of her fellow townsfolk, fell and bumped her head while rushing from her home, but there were no reports of major injuries or damage, police said.

“People are pretty much laughing it off,” said Jeanne Henslick, who works at the State Market grocery store in Coalinga.

Measured 5.0

The quake, which was measured at 5.0 on the Richter scale by the Caltech seismographic station at Pasadena, was the largest one to hit the area since aftershocks of the 1983 quake subsided about 18 months ago. A Caltech spokesman said the quake occurred at 11:26 p.m. and was centered six miles northeast of town.

The quake lasted four or five seconds, and in the words of Thrifty Drug employee Mitchell Reeves, “felt just like someone ran into the building.” But, Reeves said, “it wasn’t even close” to the 1983 quake, which knocked his house off its foundation.

Henslick said State Market suffered an estimated $15 damage--two bottles of instant coffee that tumbled from a shelf. Four years ago, the store suffered major structural damage and lost thousands of dollars in merchandise, she said.

Even so, Henslick confided, outsiders should not make too much of Coalingans’ apparent indifference toward Friday’s quake.

“People are treating it like a common occurrence,” Henslick said. “But don’t let them tell you it wasn’t scary. We aren’t that used to them.”