‘SNL’ earthquake sketch name-drops Sacramento — and a lot of innuendo

Jan. 20--Sacramento got a name-check during "Saturday Night Live" sketch about a supposed earthquake in the city in the NBC hit show's first episode of 2019.

The sketch features "SNL" cast members as local television reporters covering a quake that has trapped several people in the name-change office at a downtown federal building.

"Good afternoon," says the TV news anchor portrayed by Kate McKinnon in the 5-minute sketch. "A 4.3 magnitude earthquake rattled downtown Sacramento this morning, causing some structural damage."

"Besides the ground, what's shaking over there?" she asks the reporter, portrayed by Mikey Day. McKinnon also later asks Day "who's at fault" for the quake.

Day interviews several people who supposedly escaped the name-change office, including a man named Donald McRonald. McKinnon also gets an "update on victims" from a doctor played by the episode's guest host, Rachel Brosnahan of the popular Amazon Prime series "The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel."

Others reportedly taken to local hospitals include Bill Kosbie and Morgan Mindy, prompting a firefighter to blurt out "nanoo nanoo," the sign-off of Robin Wiliams' character on the sitcom from the 1970s and '80s.

Many of the other fictitious names given in the sketch are based on sexual innuendo or scatological humor. The video below is not meant for younger viewers.

Sacramento does not lie in an area with known faults or a history of earthquakes, but the potential for a distant temblor to be felt in the region is widely known. Many capital region residents recall feeling the magnitude-6.9 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake that rocked the Bay Area, as well as lesser, more recent shaking from the 2014 South Napa quake that was a magnitude-6.

"Large quakes from distant faults such as those in the San Francisco Bay Area or east of the Sierra Nevada can also cause significant damage to homes, businesses, and communities, especially in areas where water levels are high in soft soils that can settle unevenly during shaking," according to the California Earthquake Authority, the state-run agency responsible for providing earthquake insurance.

The show, which aired Jan. 19, also featured sketches skewering President Donald Trump and Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass.

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