Yes, swarms aside, it is still Friday, and on this channel, that means #FaultFriday. To learn more about the area around the Westmorland swarm, let’s look at the Imperial fault of southern California today.
The Imperial fault is a right-lateral strike-slip fault (ow.ly/gKEq50BIfDq) that runs south of the Salton Sea, across the US-Mexico border, and into Mexico. The Imperial fault had two significant earthquakes in the 20th century, a M6.9 in 1940 and a M6.5 in 1979.
Before the 1940 El Centro event, this fault probably did not have an earthquake in the previous 300 years. Geologists can literally uncover the history of past earthquakes along a fault by digging a shallow trench across a fault and observing and dating the offset layers.
The Imperial fault is part of the San Andreas fault system and overall Pacific-North America plate boundary. The Imperial fault transfers slip from the spreading occurring in the Gulf of Mexico and plate boundary faults in Mexico onto the San Andreas system.
The Westmorland swarm has been occurring to the north of the Imperial fault. This swarm is rupturing in an area typical of swarms, perhaps because of thin crust here and high heat flow given the seafloor spreading in the Gulf of California.
Here is a scenario event (this event has not occurred!) for shaking that could result from an M7 event on the Imperial fault. MMI>VII is expected close to the fault. Weak to light shaking would be expected >100 km from the epicenter. --🐋
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Many folks (and their kids) asked why earthquakes happen in the central and eastern U.S., far away from plate boundaries. There are many reasons! #QuakeQuestions🧵
First, the plate boundary is a lot wider than you might think. In California, most motion between the Pacific and North America plates happens on the San Andreas fault. But that plate motion is stretching the crust (and causing earthquakes) as far east as the Colorado Plateau.
In the past, the tectonic plates were very different than they are today. Remnants of ancient plates and past mountain building have left faults throughout the U.S. on which earthquakes can occur to relieve stress. And there are plenty of non-tectonic stress sources.
Ok Oregon, you asked so we’re answering your #QuakeQuestions from Monday. If you’re not already following @OregonOEM or @PNSN1 be sure to do so as they are your go-to's for local info about emergencies and earthquakes in Oregon and the Pacific Northwest.
What’s the deal with earthquakes in Oregon? As many of you mentioned in Monday's #QuakeQuestions post, this region of the U.S. is capable of hosting very large (M9!) earthquakes along the #Cascadia subduction zone where the Pacific plate slides beneath the North American plate.
How do we know such large earthquakes are possible? Check out this thread to learn more about the 1700 M9 Cascadia earthquake – the largest known earthquake to have occurred in the conterminous U.S.
Today marks the 322nd anniversary of the 1700 AD Cascadia earthquake – the largest known earthquake to have occurred in the "lower 48" United States.
This (estimated) magnitude 8-9 earthquake ruptured along the 1300-km-long Cascadia subduction zone which sits off the coast of northern California, Oregon and Washington.
Here, the eastern margins and dense oceanic crust of the Gorda and Juan De Fuca plates meet their demise as they subduct beneath the lighter continental crust of the north American plate.
Individual earthquakes can’t be usefully predicted. It’s not because they’re mystical or magical. Earthquakes obey very simple physics. The issue is that earthquakes occur deep underground.
In California, earthquakes typically rupture faults at depths of ~10 mi (~15 km). We have no eyes on the fault at depth: can’t see what materials are in the fault, where they’re lubricated by fluids, how close any point is to failure, or how large an area might fail.
If you can’t see the fault at depth, you can’t directly predict what the fault will do. Instead some researchers try to correlate large quakes with other things like having small quakes – or maybe not having small quakes? It’s not clear that there is any predictive power here.
**New publication alert**
What could happen to communication networks if a large #earthquake happened in the SF Bay Area, along the Hayward fault? 📞📱☎️📳
The new #HayWiredScenario chapter on telecommunications & ICT asks “what if” & explains why we should #TextNotTalk
Using proxies including power shutoffs, wildfires, & other earthquakes to model what happens to #telecom in a #HayWiredScenario, they found vulnerabilities in power service, cell sites on buildings and poles, and data lines crossing the fault surface rupture.
Contributing to the issue are multiple competitive service providers in a largely unregulated industry, convergence of analog and digital systems, layers of hardware and software functionality, dependence on electric power, and the rapid evolution of technology.
Yesterday afternoon, just before 4 pm local time, a M6.0 earthquake occurred at the California-Nevada border. Let’s dive deeper into some of the regional geology on this edition of #FaultFriday.
East of the San Andreas fault, the plate boundary doesn’t stop moving. Even though ~70% of the relative motion of the Pacific-North American plates occurs within the San Andreas fault system, that leaves ~30% to be accommodated elsewhere.
Moving east from the San Andreas fault from ~San Francisco, more plate motion is accommodated at the eastern rangefront of the Sierra Nevada. If you’ve ever wondered why the Sierra look even more impressive from the east than the west, enter: active tectonics.