Shaking house

[thebigcheese]

Every once in a while, my apartment shakes. It usually lasts for several minutes. It's very subtle -- you can't feel it, it's just strong enough to rattle our appliances a bit. What might be causing this? Small earthquakes? Nearby construction? Fat neighbors?

[UnluckyStuntman]

Definitely fat neighbors.

[ahem.]

Maybe nearby traffic? Like when garbage trucks or something go by.

[TheAnswerIs42]

Furnace? Might not even be your furnace, but the one above you or something. Or it could be another appliance in another apartment - like the spin cycle on their washer or something.

[Dead Cat]

It's possible that you have an infestation of tunnel worms. See also #58077.

[bobtheenchantedone]

I am totally voting fat neighbors.

Or construction. We just get pinging noises from time to time, but if you're closer to construction, then it might affect you more.

[mic0]

When the construction by my house was worse a few months ago the whole house would shake.

[Unit of Energy]

I grew up in a mobile home aka a trailer aka a manufactured house. It was a small, unstable house, and whenever a door was slammed the house would shake. Or if the washing machine was unbalanced the house would shake. Or, since we were in California, we felt many more earthquakes than our friends with foundations under their houses.

[Emiliana]

I was in my first earthquake a few weeks ago! I was staying in a motel in Kampala (not the safest city in the world) and for about a split second was positive it was a bomb, before I also remembered that Kampala also gets occasional earthquakes.

/random

[Waldorf and Sauron]

One time I was in the Band Room in my high school, and the room started shaking a little — I thought it was a construction truck driving past outside. It turned out, a house exploded a mile away.

So maybe it's exploding houses.

[vorpal blade]

Explosions frequently rattle my windows.

As long as we are telling stories, a friend of a family member tells the story that they had a plumber over to fix the garbage disposal. When he finished the woman who owned the home asked the plumber to try it out. Just as he flipped the switch a severe earthquake struck and the whole house began to shake violently.

"Turn it off! Turn it off!" she said.

[bobtheenchantedone]

Something exploded one night in Springville a couple of years ago. I was singing in a church with some friends, and we thought a car had run into the building.

[thebigcheese]

This actually reminds me of two things:

• - Thing the first. My parents live near some explosive-type place, perhaps some sort of mining operation. I really don't know what it is, but they feel and hear the explosions several times per day.
  - Thing the second. In high school, someone put a pipe bomb in one of the lockers directly below my physics classroom. It went off during class, and it sounded like someone had just plowed right into the classroom door. We didn't know what it was...until the news came on later that night.

[Whistler]

We live across from railroad tracks and our house shakes whenever a train goes by... but it seems like you'd notice a train.