VIDEO | The Croatian earthquake “woke up” an 80-year-old seismograph in Timisoara. “Suddenly I heard a mechanical tic” Freedom

Croatia was shaken on Tuesday, December 29, by an earthquake measuring 6.4 on the Richter scale, according to the Euro-Mediterranean Seismological Center.

It occurred at a depth of 10 kilometers in a central region of the country, followed by several aftershocks, according to local media. Two more earthquakes occurred in Croatia on Wednesday morning.

At least seven people lost their lives in Tuesday’s earthquake.

The shock wave was felt in Timisoara

The earthquake was also felt in Timisoara. At the local Seismological Observatory, a device that was deemed non-functional was “awakened to life.”

“I was at the observatory and I was fixing models in the engine room. Complete silence. Suddenly I heard a mechanical tick … I looked around … nothing. Then I approached the mechanical pendulum devices, made in the 1940s by Professor Ioan Curea, and I noticed that the pendulum began to swing more and more. I looked at him with my soul in my mouth and with a terrible emotion, because I understood that somewhere, not far, but not very close, there is a strong earthquake, ”says Adina Rău Vanciu, a seismological engineer at the Timișoara Observatory.

“The greater my excitement, the more these devices do not work, and the seismic pendulum weighs 540 kg. It took a lot of energy to awaken these mechanical devices. I had to find out where it was coming from, so I went in to check the RasberryShake educational seismometer recording… and found out its location, magnitude, and depth. Soon the news came out, “said Adina Rău Vanciu.

The device was made by the observatory’s founder, John Curea, after consulting with Charles Richter.

At the Timișoara observatory there are a total of four of these devices, which have an impressive weight and cannot be moved. Basically, they are considered museum pieces.

The mechanical seismographs were made in the 1940s by the observatory’s founder, Ioan Curea, who at the time consulted with the famous seismologist Professor Charles Richter, one of the inventors of the Richter scale.

The device was decommissioned in the 1990s and was even considered broken.

“We have four of those devices, for 30 years they were out of service from a technological point of view, they were out of date. In the 90s newer devices were received, which worked analog, and later they were replaced by digital. The mechanical devices are very old and were manufactured in the 1940s by the founder of the observatory, Professor Ioan Curea. He made these seismographs in direct correspondence with Professor Charles Richter. Some parts were manufactured at the Timisoara transport company. They are outdated, but it was a very strong earthquake, ”Adina Rău Vanciu also said.

“I noticed that the lamp in the living room was still swinging.”

The Timișoara seismologist says that he personally did not feel the earthquake, but other people from Timișoara felt the movement in Croatia. Alexandra lives in North Timișoara and she told us that the sofa moved with her.

“I was sitting on the couch reading. At one point I had a strange feeling of dizziness and thought it was from fatigue. But it only lasted a few seconds and it seemed strange to me, at which point I thought maybe it was an earthquake. Then I realized that the lamp in the living room was still swinging and I realized that it had indeed been an earthquake. I asked the neighbors of the group if they were feeling and I looked for news on the internet and then my suspicion was confirmed “, Alexandra told us Taking.

Another Timisoara resident told us that two out of four family members felt the earthquake in Croatia quite strongly, on the fourth floor of a block of flats in the Steaua neighborhood, located in the south of the city.

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