Clintonville booms quiet down, frustrations remain

CLINTONVILLE - One week after noises and vibrations started waking and shaking residents in the small Waupaca County city, Clintonville experienced a fairly quiet Saturday night and Sunday morning with only three reports to police.

While there is an official cause on the books, (the United States Geological Service concluded Thursday a 1.5 magnitude earthquake shook the town shortly after 5 am Tuesday) some residents like Joanne Christiansen say rampant speculation is not helping bring normalcy back to their town.

"Everybody's acting either like it's a hoax,” said Christiansen, who moved back to Clintonville in October. “Or the people that are already here – that know that it happened – they have no idea. They're very confused."

Julie Aschenbrenner has another problem.

Aschenbrenner says she hasn't heard or felt a thing.

But she has seen an effect the reported noises and vibrations are having on her kids.

"They don't want to do their homework at night,” said Aschenbrenner. “And it's hard to get them to stay focused on what they have to do"

So as resident's questions and frustrations surrounding the noises continue, city leaders say the issue isn't put to bed, yet.

“I think that the whole three days of mystery behind it will certainly add to the fact that people will continue to look for reasons for a while," said Clintonville City Administrator Lisa Kuss.

Kuss says the city will look at educating residents about earthquakes, because that's what they can – as of right now – confirm as a cause of the noises and vibrations.

But Kuss says that doesn't mean other explanations won't be pursued.

"We want people to continue to call (in reports of noises and vibrations), even though, certainly it's gone on for a while and it clearly is diminishing,” said Kuss. “We're going to continue to do what we can, if there is anything that makes sense, from a logical standpoint, to do that."

So what's behind the small, but continued reports of booming noises and vibrations since Tuesday's confirmed earthquake?

FOX 11’s Bill Miston spoke with USGS geophysicist Paul Caruso in a phone interview Sunday. Caruso says he cannot immediately explain the continued reports.

“What they're experiencing, now, whether the vibrations are additional quakes, or not, we're going to try to locate as many as we can," said Caruso.

Kuss says the recently returned seismic monitoring devices could be brought back, if needed.

Kuss says the city plans to sell t-shirts commemorating the rare earthquake event.

She says where the money from the shirts will go will be decided at a later date, but says it will used to benefit the public.