England Gets Hit By Second Earthquake in Less Than a Month
A 3.6 magnitude earthquake struck in North Yorkshire at approximately 9 p.m. today, the second quake to hit England in the span of two weeks.
Last month, right before Christmas, a 3.5 magnitude earthquake shook Coniston in the Lake District of northwest England.
But before anyone's knickers get in a twist, today's quake was only 6 kilometers deep. Dr. Aoife O'Mongain from the British Geological Survey told The Telegraph, "It would have only lasted for a couple of seconds. And at that strength it is not likely that it would have caused any damage."
While news reports say nearby residents felt their desks shaking and heard what they thought was helicopter rumbling, most people tweeting from England didn't seem much bothered by the quake.
Source
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
N.H. earthquake goes boom in the night
Dawn Roach of Plymouth, N.H., said that when she woke up last night, she thought either a bomb had gone off or a tree had fallen on her home.
"I was in bed sleeping and all of the sudden there was a big boom," said Roach, a clerical assistant at Plymouth City Hall. "It was a big shake."
A small earthquake rumbled under central New Hampshire late last night, according to the US Geological Survey. The agency says the 2.6-magnitude earthquake was recorded at 11:46 p.m. near Plymouth, N.H. The quake originated about three miles underground.
By midday today, the agency had fielded more than 80 reports from people from about two dozen nearby towns who felt the temblor, according to the agency's website.
The most intense shaking was reported by a resident in Franklin. One resident from West Newbury, Mass., about 75 miles away, reported feeling the temblor.
Roach said the earthquake lasted only a few seconds, but that it shook the entire house.
"I've felt just small, little tremors, but this was larger than anything I've experienced," Roach said.
Kimberly Knight-Gray of Moultonborough, N.H., said she heard a huge rumble during the night, and that it lasted for one second.
"It was cool, like when a huge truck drives by your house," said Knight-Gray, 48, who works as an administrative assistant at Ashland Elementary School in Ashland, N.H. "Most everyone had felt it; we talked about it when we got to work."
She said her boyfriend knew it was an earthquake right away, and surveyed the interior of the house to make sure everything was intact. Her dogs -- three English setters and a boxer -- ran around the house, barking, she said.
Janet Sargent of Meredith, N.H., said she immediately recognized the tremors as an earthquake.
"I knew what it was, what else could it be?" said Sargent, 67, who is retired. "We've had little ones there before, but this one was stronger than the other ones that I have felt. It was weird."
She said that her entire home didn't shake, just the ground.
Earthquakes "are not bad around here, so I didn't panic or anything," Sargent said.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Indiana earthquake 'extremely rare and unprecedented'
An Indiana earthquake Thursday, measured at a magnitude of 3.8, is the strongest ever recorded in that part of the state, which rarely sees earthquakes. No damage has been reported.
An 3.8 magnitude earthquake centered near Kokomo, Ind. (pictured here in a 1998 photo) hit Thursday morning.
Newscom/file
An earthquake that took place before sunrise Thursday in north central Indiana is being evaluated as rare despite many well-known fault lines in the area.
The US Geological Survey reported a 3.8-magnitude earthquake, centered just east of Kokomo, Ind., about 57 miles north of Indianapolis. The earthquake occurred about 3 miles underground and could be felt as far south as Indianapolis, as far east as Dayton, Ohio and as far northwest as Elgin, Ill., about 40 miles outside Chicago.
Calling the earthquake "extremely rare and unprecedented," John Steinmetz, director of the Indiana Geological Survey at Indiana University in Bloomington, said there have not been any earthquakes of similar magnitude in northern Indiana in 175 years. Mr. Steinmetz added that it demonstrates how little is known about the earth's structure in that region of the country.
"We use earthquakes to plot the location of seismic activity and try to get a better picture of the deep earth. But because, in this part of the world, [earthquakes are] so infrequent and so rare, we have no picture," he says.
Thursday's earthquake has nothing to do with the nearby Wabash Valley Fault line but it may be connected to the Sharpsville Fault Line, located just north of Indianapolis.
Compared with the West Coast, where earthquakes are more frequent and usually have a magnitude rating of 5.0 and higher, tremors in the Midwest are infrequent and geologists often are hard pressed to come up with a reason why they happen.
Whether the earthquake was an isolated event or an indicator of a fault zone becoming active, "we can't say we know that for sure simply because we don't know how deep the faults are," Steinmetz says.
One of the reasons why so little is known is the lack of adequate equipment: He adds that funding requests to the Department of Homeland Security or the US Geological Survey to cover sophisticated seismic recording instruments would likely "fall on deaf ears because the frequency of earthquakes are so minimal or nonexistent."
One of the nation's most dangerous fault zones lies in the Midwest. The New Madrid fault line, named after the small town in southeast Missouri and covering areas of Illinois, Missouri, Arkansas, Kentucky, Tennessee and Mississippi, was responsible for several earthquakes in the early 19th century. Although several minor quakes have occurred along the New Madrid fault over the years, the last major disruption was in the 1811-1812 winter when a succession of four earthquakes over three months famously caused the Mississippi River to temporarily flow backward and had aftershocks travel as far as Boston and Toronto.
In 2008, the Federal Emergency Management Agency reported that because earthquake preparedness is relatively minimal compared with California and the Pacific Northwest, another quake of that magnitude could cause "the highest economic losses due to a natural disaster in the United States."
Because the New Madrid fault zone has not generated any major activity since that time, Steinmetz says the scientific community is torn between those who believe it is "just being quiet or is permanently spent or shut off." The debate, he says, has yet to be resolved.
Source--
Got Penguins?
Penguin News Today
The Science of Penguins
The Gentoos are back! Come see them on live cam at:
Gentoo Penguins of Gars O'Higgins Station, Antarctica
__._,_.___
No comments:
Post a Comment