An unrestrained plane rigid body resting on a horizontal surface which shakes horizontally and vertically may assume one of the five modes of response: rest, slide, slide-rock, rock, and free flight. The first four are nontrivial modes of motion. It is important to study which one of these responses is started from rest as in most studies it is often assumed that the initial mode is the particular mode of response. Criteria governing the initiation of modes are first briefly discussed. It is shown that the commencement of response modes depends on the aspect ratio of the body, coefficients of static and kinetic friction at the body-base interface, and the magnitude of maximum base accelerations. Considering the last two factors as random variables, the initiation of response modes is next studied from a probabilistic point of view. Type 1 extreme value and lognormal distributions are employed for maximum base excitations and coefficient of friction respectively. Analytical expressions for computing the probability values of each mode of response are derived. The effects of slenderness ratio, vertical acceleration, and statistical distributions of maximum acceleration and coefficient of friction are shown through numerical results and plots.