May 10, 1897 Earthquake: Beachport,robe,kingston,mount Gambier, Australia

Reference #14032:

The issue of 12 May 1897 carried an extensive report, beginning with the observations from Mount Gambier itself:

[…] The first intimation people received of the internal earth disturbance was a loud rumbling sound, like that which might be caused by a runaway waggon on a rough metalled road, It rapidly grew in intensity and as rapidly faded away, its whole duration being perhaps 30 seconds. It was accompanied by a violent agitation of the earth, which made trees, fences, telegraph poles, and buildings sway in an alarming fashion. The whole earth seemed in motion, and people actually assert that on looking at the surface they distinctly observed the undulations […] It is thought that there were at least two or three distinct shocks, very close to each other, and of nearly the same violence. There was hardly time, and few people had the presence of mind to take a record of the duration of the shock, but most in Mount Gambier seem to think it lasted 20 to 30 seconds, Mr. Boerke, of the Square Mile school, says he timed it, and made it 1¼ minutes, At Beachport the repeated tremors are said to have continued three or four minutes, The swaying motion of the earth was of such a character that many persons say if it had continued much longer they would have become sea-sick […] the shock was not a local disturbance was soon made known when telegrams were received from towns all over the South-East, and even from Adelaide and Victoria, showing that it had been felt over a range of several hundred miles […] Considerable damage was done to buildings in the town and neighbourhood. The way in which some of them rocked made it surprising that more of the stone structures did not fall down; but the damage was confined to the collapse or shattering of chimneys, the crosses on churches, the fall of ceilings, and the cracking of walls […] The Courthouse was greatly shaken and considerable damage was done. The greatest injury was to the front of the building, where a crack extends between the ceiling and the front wall at the cornice across the whole breadth of the court-room, and, going right through the walls at each side, is visible from the outside.

A telegram from Beachport on Monday evening stated that a severe earthquake that afternoon had done a great amount of damage there […] It is said there were two severe shocks, continuing for three or four minutes, and that the direction of the earthquake was from west to east.

A terrible earthquake happened here [Robe] to-day, the course of which was apparently from south-east to north-west. No such calamity has been known here before, Many buildings are in ruins, and nearly every house in the township has suffered.

[…] at Wangolina several houses were demolished […]