UK witnesses thought that armageddon had come last night, as much of the country was rocked by an earthquake - and we don't get earthquakes in England!
The British Geological Survey says the epicentre of the earthquake was "right under the city of Birmingham" - the land of Farkel's ancestors.
But people as far apart as south and west Wales, Northamptonshire, south Yorkshire and Oxfordshire felt the tremors which shook homes, broke windows and set off alarms at around 12.54am.
Glenn Ford of the British Geological Survey (BGS) says the earthquake reached 4.8 on the Richter scale.
"It's an extremely large earthquake in UK terms but not large in world terms, we'd only classify it as a light earthquake.
"This would have been right under the city of Birmingham itself and we've already had reports of the fire brigade being called out to fallen chimneys."
The earthquake would have lasted for at least 10-15 seconds, he said. The BGS only registered one tremor, though some members of the public reported feeling two separate tremors.
Mr Ford added: "This will have been felt by the whole of Wales and England. We have been swamped by calls and e-mails from across Powys, in Wales, and from Yorkshire, Berkshire and Milton Keynes."
Julian Bukits, an assistant seismologist with the BGS, says an earthquake of magnitude 4 is equivalent to 1,000 tonnes of TNT which is equivalent to the power of a small nuclear weapon.
Mr Bukits said: "An earthquake like the one we've just experienced happens regularly in places like California and in natural earthquake zones. There are no plate borders here so it may just be a local fault. Nonetheless, for the UK it's a big earthquake."
So there you have it. First vultures in Cornwall, war in Iraq soon and now earthquakes in the UK. Certainly the time is short, the situation is urgent indeed. This is no time to be complacent!
See ya down the pub.
Englishman.
Edited by - Englishman on 23 September 2002 11:5:45