Lakedistrict seismic activity?

Capt. Clueless

Capt. Clueless

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A few times now, I have been asleep on my boat on Ullswater on a flat calm night, no wind and the lake so still, when suddenly there are a succesion of waves bobbing us about, (Like wash you get from the steamer)and then afterwards goes flat calm again. Could there be seismic activity under the lake?
 
In the Aegean Sea we are frequently anchored in utterly calm conditions when quite sizeable waves suddenly appear. They seem to be wash from some vessel but are often in locations where this would apparently be impossible. Almost certainly not seismic as these would presumably be reported.
 
Capt. Clueless said:
A few times now, I have been asleep on my boat on Ullswater on a flat calm night, no wind and the lake so still, when suddenly there are a succesion of waves bobbing us about, (Like wash you get from the steamer)and then afterwards goes flat calm again. Could there be seismic activity under the lake?
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In a word no, there is nowhere in the UK that is so seismically active that the phenomena you describe can be attributed to seismic activity
 
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Capt. Clueless said:
A few times now, I have been asleep on my boat on Ullswater on a flat calm night, no wind and the lake so still, when suddenly there are a succesion of waves bobbing us about, (Like wash you get from the steamer)and then afterwards goes flat calm again. Could there be seismic activity under the lake?
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It's one of Lakesailor's backfires reveerberating.
 
Sandy said:
These are the people to ask

https://www.bgs.ac.uk/
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I used to work for them.

Here's a map of all the earthquakes recorded in the Lake District since 1970 (red dots). These are all deep (10-20km) and mostly low magnitude events, which the seismic network will pick up but which people won't. They are not all that frequent either. The OP has experienced waves on the lake "several times now" which is likely more frequent than the higher-magnitude events shown here. Moreover surface seismic waves (of the sort that would set up movement in the water) are more noticeable when the epicentre is very shallow, e.g. in the tsunami events of the last ten years when the ocean floor itself has been displaced.

So no its probably not seismic activity.

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Capt. Clueless said:
A few times now, I have been asleep on my boat on Ullswater on a flat calm night, no wind and the lake so still, when suddenly there are a succesion of waves bobbing us about, (Like wash you get from the steamer)and then afterwards goes flat calm again. Could there be seismic activity under the lake?
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Was this in summer? Had it been windy in the day?
 
Perhaps we are still testing nuclear bomb triggers down the copper mines in Patterdale or even bombs!
 
Capt. Clueless said:
No, it was only about 3 weeks or so ago, when there was that beautiful calm weather for a week with no wind whatsoever.
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Thanks. I asked the questions because: (i) the wind blowing along the axis of a long narrow lake can induce a small tilt in water level towards the leeward end, and (ii) if the lake has stratified, that effect occurs in the warmer surface water above the thermocline, and the colder water below tilts in the opposite direction in compensation.

When the wind ceases to blow the ‘relaxation’ would result in small water flows back down the lake at the surface – and in stratified conditions, in the reverse direction at depth. This can induce standing waves – seiches – at the surface and at the thermocline, but I also wondered if the flows might in certain circumstances also result in small progressive waves, as you describe.
 
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