The earthquake that jolted northern California yesterday registered 5.6 on the Richter scale, but it was off the charts in Buzz. Demand for "california earthquake" (+13,804%), "usgs earthquake" (+4,976%), "recent earthquake" (+2,302%), and "usgs" (+1,643%) logged staggering increases.

Considering that the temblor struck the Golden State at 8:04 p.m. and Buzz data rolls over to the next day at 9 p.m. PT, the numbers are all the more impressive. Residents of the Bay Area must have leapt for their computers the minute the sofa stopped trembling.

Local radio and TV stations absorbed a wash of Web traffic. KRON 4, nbc11.com, KTVU, KCRA, KPIX, and KGO radio surged in lookups. Queries for maps of the seismic activity shuddered upwards, and the threat of another shaker boosted "bay area earthquake watch," "california earthquake authority," and "california earthquake insurance." 

After securing information on the quake itself, many searchers' thoughts turned to temblors past. 'Twas the night before Halloween, and the ghosts of "1906 san francisco earthquake," "1989 loma prieta earthquake," and "san francisco earthquake 1989" returned to rattle the Search box once more.