US West Coast Earthquake...............warning?

[Sandyman]

Thought this might be of interest to some. Our interest is that our Daughter & her family live in Sacramento.

https://www.superstation95.com/index.php/world/779

 

[macd]

Mmm. For the worst possible (but unlikely) scenario for the Cascadia subduction zone, “Our operating assumption is that everything west of Interstate 5 will be toast.”

 

[sarabande]

I am slightly puzzled by the headlines and content of that article.


The US Geological Survey is red-hot on emergency management, and yet there is nothing on their website.

No warnings, just the standard academic work on Cascadia.

http://www.usgs.gov/natural_hazards/emergencymanagement/

When there is slippage over a very short time, that is when tsunamis (e.g. Japan) take place. A gentle slide over several hours (looks like 6 from the incomplete graph) will be much less energetic.

If you are in contact with family over there, I'd suggest the USGS site to be monitored, rather than a New York Radio Station that says " The heat from the friction of the two massive plates rubbing together, melts the Juan de Fuca plate into Magma (lava)."

 

[Tony Cross]

I am slightly puzzled by the headlines and content of that article.


The US Geological Survey is red-hot on emergency management, and yet there is nothing on their website.

No warnings, just the standard academic work on Cascadia.

http://www.usgs.gov/natural_hazards/emergencymanagement/

When there is slippage over a very short time, that is when tsunamis (e.g. Japan) take place. A gentle slide over several hours (looks like 6 from the incomplete graph) will be much less energetic.

If you are in contact with family over there, I'd suggest the USGS site to be monitored, rather than a New York Radio Station that says " The heat from the friction of the two massive plates rubbing together, melts the Juan de Fuca plate into Magma (lava)."

My first action was to visit the USGS website (usgs.gov) and as you say, there is nothing at all on there either in their newsroom nor in the earthquake monitor. One possibility may be that the buoy has malfunctioned in some way?

I'm not saying this isn't true, but there are several "tests" that can be applied to reports like this to see whether they may just be hoaxes:

1. There are no external links to authoritative sources in that report.

2. It's a long and at times a rambling report.

3. It contains sentences in red (other hoaxes use capitals) to add to the scare.

All these are typical of hoax stories, so I'm personally quite suspicious. I'd bookmark the USGS website if you're worried, those guys are generally quick off the mark for hazards of this type....

 

[AntarcticPilot]

Basically, a few feet change in sea-level over a long time isn't signalling anything of importance. It could be an eddy in an ocean current; it could be a low or high pressure system passing over, it could even be a fault in the data collection buoy! If the change in sea-level was related to earthquake event, a) it would be abrupt and b) there'd have been a tsunami by now if the ocean floor really had dropped by that much. Someone with little understanding of earth systems has taken one set of readings in isolation and put it together with half-understood freshman geology to make 2+2=20! It has been rebutted by relevant experts; the journalist has chosen not to act with humility and accept she knows less than they do.

I am a degree level geologist who has published papers on sea-level change and vulcanism (Cooper, A.P.R., J.L. Smellie and J. Maylin, Evidence for shallowing and uplift from historical bathymetric records of Deception Island, Antarctica: Antarctic Science, 10, 455-461, 1998.)