[Chicago Sandy]

That was the article to which I referred in my Cajon Pass brushfire thread. I lived in Seattle (U. Dist. a block uphill from the Ship Canal) for 7 years and experienced a few “nuisance-level” quakes (plus a slightly bigger one when I went back for a visit 20 years later), but ironically the biggest quake I felt was one in NYC in Jan. 1994 (centered near Albany, felt only in the Bronx and on anything floating in the surrounding rivers--including the floating dining room section of Brooklyn's River Cafe, which was slammed against its moorings).

True, here we can get tornadoes (had a couple touch down today in the far NW ‘burbs and southern WI), but we get at least a few minutes' warning, and all public buildings have designated tornado shelter areas. (We do spend an anxious hour or so in our basement once every couple of summers). We also get plenty of advance notice of floods (including flash), and we all know the mantra “turn around, don’t drown.”