You are at home eating breakfast, preparing for school. As you eat a bowl of cereal, you suddenly notice that the juice in your glass is rocking back and forth, as if someone has just nudged the glass. Then you begin to feel the vibrations. The lamp above your head begins to sway, and the box of cereal on the table in front of you falls over. The vibrations increase quickly. You suddenly think to yourself, it's an earthquake! What do you do now?

Why is it so important to be prepared and to know what to do if an earthquake hits? Most earthquakes last only a few seconds, but it can seem like a long time when you actually experience one. As we have already seen, planning for an earthquake decreases your chances of getting injured when one actually occurs. However, you also need to know what to expect and how to react during an actual earthquake.