GREENVILLE – Greenville resident, Jared McLear felt the first of the two powerful earthquakes to hit California this past weekend from his eighth floor Anaheim Hilton hotel room overlooking the hotel’s swimming pool.
“At first it just felt like a little bit of a rumble but then the furniture in the hotel room started to move,” said McLear. “The desk chair I was sitting in started to move a little bit so we knew it was an earthquake. The hotel just kind of rocked back and forth like you were in a boat, for probably 45 seconds or so.”
The 6.4 magnitude earthquake rattle Southern California on Thursday, the largest to hit the region in 20 years. The quake struck near the city of Ridgecrest located about 160 miles northeast of Los Angeles. Some injuries were reported in Ridgecrest.
“I looked down to the swimming pool and you could see the water kind of sloshing back and forth,” McLear noted. “It wasn’t really coming out of the swimming pool but you could see that it was moving from one side of the pool to the other.”
The United States Geological Survey said the quake struck at 10:33 a.m. PT. The quake was felt more than 150 miles away in Los Angeles, but no damage was reported.
McLear was with the Miami Valley CTC at the FCLA National Leadership Conference held at the Anaheim Conference Center in California and was coaching first base for his daughter, Ella’s Greenville softball team at the weekend 7th/8th Grade Cross County League Tournament at Stebbins Field before the 7.1 earthquake hit the same area of California Friday night.
“We came home yesterday – traveled all day yesterday and got home before the 7.1 earthquake,” McLear concluded.
