The 1933 earthquake in Long Beach, California, caused significant damage to school buildings but no deaths because it occurred at a time when school was not in session (57). In Guatemala, the 1976 quake, which killed 24,000 people, occurred at 3:05 AM while everyone was asleep. If the same quake had occurred later in the day, many more people would have been outside and thus would not have been injured (58). On the other hand, the 1994 Northridge earthquake in southern California killed about 60 people (9,59), yet the number of injuries and deaths among the 700,000 school children and 6 million commuters likely would have been much worse if the earthquake had occurred at 9:31 AM on a school and work day instead of 4:31 AM on a holiday. Thus, the time of day that an earthquake occurs is a crucial factor in the number of casualties.