UPDATE:
Magnitude-6.8
Earthquake Shakes Northern Chile
A
magnitude-6.8 earthquake shook offices, toppled supermarket shelves
and broke windows on Wednesday in north-central Chile, where people
fled some buildings in panic.
30
January, 2013
A
50-year-old woman in the city of Copiapo died of a heart attack, said
Atacama Regional Governor Rafael Prohens, who attributed her death to
fear during the quake. Authorities said that damage was limited and
discounted the possibility of a tsunami.
The
U.S. Geological Survey originally reported the quake at 6.7, but
later revised it upward. It struck at 4:15 p.m. (3:15 p.m.; 2015 GMT)
and was centered 27 miles (44 kilometers) north of Vallenar, Chile.
The
quake shook the capital of Santiago, causing office buildings to
sway, but was felt most powerfully in the north where state
television showed images of scattered groceries at supermarket floors
and broken windows at several homes in Vallenar, Copiapo and other
nearby cities.
Witnesses
described people running from buildings into the streets in panic.
Vallenar
Mayor Cristian Tapia said telephone lines were jammed and some
electricity lines were temporarily down but services were slowly
returning.
"The
first half hour was really tough. We're still having problems with
telecommunications," Tapia told state television. "Two
walls collapsed. We're evaluating ruptures at homes to find out if
they're still safe to live in."
But
Chile's Emergency Office, ONEMI, said no injuries were immediately
reported and damage to infrastructure appears minimal. The
oceanographic service discounted the possibility of a tsunami.
"There's
no doubt the population in some places fled, following a culture of
evacuation," Miguel Ortiz, national chief of the early alert
center at ONEMI. Two lower intensity aftershocks were also reported.
A
devastating 8.8-magnitude quake and the tsunami it unleashed in 2010,
killed 551 people, destroyed 220,000 homes and washed away docks,
riverfronts and seaside resorts. The disaster cost Chile $30 billion,
or 18 percent of its annual gross domestic product.
Chile
is one of the most earthquake-prone countries in the world.
Just
off Chile's long coast, the Nazca tectonic plate plunges beneath the
continent, pushing the Andes to ever-higher altitudes. The 2010 quake
was so strong it changed time, shortening the Earth's day slightly by
changing the planet's rotation.
The
strongest earthquake ever recorded also happened in Chile, a
magnitude-9.5 in 1960 that killed more than 5,000 people.
NZ: White
Island's lake dries up
The
hot crater lake on White Island has now completely dried up as
explosive rocks, mud and gas continue to be thrown into the air from
the active volcano.
30
January, 2013
White
Island has been spewing a steady stream of gas since activity heated
up in December. It's the most active the volcano has been since 2000.
GNS
Science vulcanologist Brad Scott said a "small tuff cone"
was forming on the bottom of the crater lake, and the active vent was
producing "vigorous bursts" of mud, rock, steam and gas up
to 100 metres into the air.
"GNS
Science's past monitoring of the island shows that new eruptive
episodes often develop out of this type of activity," Scott
said.
"Small
muddy lakes sometimes form in craters. As the unrest develops
geysering and explosions occur through these lakes, becoming more
vigorous with time."
He
said the activity did not necessarily mean an explosion or full-scale
eruption would happen, although one could at any time.
Even
though there was an elevated risk to tourists on the island,
conditions weren't so dangerous that people could not travel there.
Tourism
has, in fact, been booming at White Island as the volcano heats up,
with visitors eager to see some explosive action.
Frontier
Helicopters is one of three helicopter tour operators which fly
around the island.
Owner
Mark Law said there had definitely been a greater interest in the
activity from visitors lately.
"It
is our busy season, so it's a little hard to gauge whether or not
more people are coming to visit the island because of it, but there
is a greater awareness about the island from tourists, definitely,"
he said.
Law
said company worked closely with GNS to assess the safety and in a
worst-case scenario – a full scale eruption – it would simply
mean they would not be able to fly as close.
"The
only thing is, if it gets to any serious level of activity there's an
exclusion zone which we operate by, because you can never tell just
how far it will throw rocks," Law said.
At
this stage, it was still possible to get reasonably close to the
crater.
One
of the pilots from Frontier was able to get about 180 metres away to
film some spectacular footage of the explosions on Monday.
5.3 magntiude earthquake strikes off the coast of Oregon
31
January, 2013
January 31, 2013 – OREGON - A magnitude 5.3 earthquake struck about 170 miles off the southern Oregon coast. The National Weather Service’s West Coast and Alaska Tsunami Warning Center said there was no danger of a tsunami from the Tuesday evening quake. There were no immediate reports of damage. The U.S. Geological Survey’s National Earthquake Information Center in Golden, Colo., said the 7:14 p.m. PST quake occurred at a depth of 6.4 miles. By 10 p.m., the center’s website had logged four reports from people who said they felt a weak shaking from the quake. In the last 12 months, the number of quakes erupting off the coast of Oregon has been moderately increasing.
–--The Extinction Protocol
Quakes
continue to plague East Texas
A 3.9-magnitude earthquake occurred on May 10, and on May 17, there was a 4.8-magnitude earthquake, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. Those were followed by a 2.7-magnitude on May 20; a 2.5-magnitude on May 26; a 2.1-magnitude on June 16; a 2.8-magnitude on Dec. 7; a 2.6-magnitude on Dec. 22; and Friday’s earthquake. The most recent earthquake — a 2.8-magnitude — occurred about 6:30 a.m. Tuesday. Timpson court clerk Paula Mullins said Tuesday’s earthquake wasn’t as bad as Friday’s. It just kind of felt like a sonic boom,” she recalled. She said residents discuss earthquakes when they come, and everybody wonders why. “Everybody’s got their own idea of fracking or God giving us a wake-up call,” she said. “It’s just happening, and we don’t know (why).” Cliff Frohlich, associate director at The University of Texas at Austin Institute for Geophysics, said Tuesday there is a fault system in East Texas called the Mount Enterprise fault system, which has been known for a long time. He said faults there can get reactivated by stresses of various kinds, and some people say the fault system may be related to a 1981 Center earthquake and an 1891 Rusk earthquake. Frohlich said there’s been a lot of interest in human causes of Texas earthquakes in relation to the injection of fluids into the ground. He said there are wells near where Timpson earthquakes were the strongest, and it’s possible that the injection of disposable fluids played a role. Sometimes when you inject fluids you get earthquakes, (and) in Texas there are (numerous) disposable wells,” he said. Frohlich noted that faults are also everywhere, and some might be as small as a football field or garage. He said there is friction to help prevent faults from slipping, but if fluids are pumped in, it can become “like an air hockey table. If mankind is causing them, it’s triggering faults that were stuck…,” he said. “If conditions are right for a fault to move, it moves.”
–Tyler Paper
Earthquakes in the world on January 30, 2013 (M4.5 or more) – Very strong earthquake in Northern Chile
SRC
|
Location
|
UTC Date/time
|
M
|
D
|
INFORMATION
|
|
ER
|
I Felt A (not Listed) Strong Earthquake
|
Jan 30 23:59 PM
|
4.6
|
0.1
|
||
USGS
|
Santa Cruz Islands
|
Jan 30 23:03 PM
|
6.0
|
10.0
|
||
GEOFON
|
Santa Cruz Islands
|
Jan 30 23:03 PM
|
6.0
|
10.0
|
||
EMSC
|
Santa Cruz Islands
|
Jan 30 23:03 PM
|
6.0
|
40.0
|
||
EMSC
|
Atacama, Chile
|
Jan 30 20:55 PM
|
4.6
|
69.0
|
||
EMSC
|
Atacama, Chile
|
Jan 30 20:40 PM
|
4.7
|
20.0
|
||
GEOFON
|
Near Coast Of Northern Chile
|
Jan 30 20:40 PM
|
4.8
|
10.0
|
||
USGS
|
Atacama, Chile
|
Jan 30 20:15 PM
|
6.8
|
45.7
|
||
SSUCH
|
Huasco, Vallenar, Chile
|
Jan 30 20:15 PM
|
6.7
|
52.2
|
||
USGS
|
Atacama, Chile
|
Jan 30 20:15 PM
|
6.7
|
25.4
|
||
GEOFON
|
Central Chile
|
Jan 30 20:15 PM
|
6.7
|
47.0
|
||
EMSC
|
Atacama, Chile
|
Jan 30 20:15 PM
|
6.8
|
46.0
|
||
PTWC
|
Central Chile
|
Jan 30 20:15 PM
|
6.7
|
25.0
|
||
|
||||||
WCATWC
|
Central Chile
|
Jan 30 20:15 PM
|
6.6
|
43.0
|
||
EMSC
|
Northern Qinghai, China
|
Jan 30 17:32 PM
|
4.6
|
2.0
|
||
GEOFON
|
Qinghai, China
|
Jan 30 17:32 PM
|
4.6
|
10.0
|
||
USGS
|
Philippine Islands Region
|
Jan 30 15:34 PM
|
4.7
|
37.3
|
||
EMSC
|
Philippine Islands Region
|
Jan 30 15:34 PM
|
4.7
|
30.0
|
||
GEOFON
|
Philippine Islands Region
|
Jan 30 15:34 PM
|
4.6
|
34.0
|
||
EMSC
|
Southern Mid-atlantic Ridge
|
Jan 30 13:25 PM
|
4.9
|
10.0
|
||
USGS
|
Southern Mid-atlantic Ridge
|
Jan 30 13:25 PM
|
4.9
|
10.0
|
||
GEOFON
|
Talaud Islands, Indonesia
|
Jan 30 13:18 PM
|
4.7
|
22.0
|
||
EMSC
|
Kepulauan Talaud, Indonesia
|
Jan 30 13:18 PM
|
4.7
|
22.0
|
||
USGS
|
Philippine Islands Region
|
Jan 30 12:57 PM
|
5.0
|
35.0
|
||
EMSC
|
Philippine Islands Region
|
Jan 30 12:57 PM
|
5.1
|
38.0
|
||
GEOFON
|
Philippine Islands Region
|
Jan 30 12:57 PM
|
5.0
|
31.0
|
||
EMSC
|
Atacama, Chile
|
Jan 30 09:33 AM
|
4.8
|
2.0
|
||
GEOFON
|
Northern Chile
|
Jan 30 09:33 AM
|
4.9
|
23.0
|
||
USGS
|
Atacama, Chile
|
Jan 30 09:33 AM
|
4.8
|
24.7
|
||
EMSC
|
Xizang-qinghai Border Region
|
Jan 30 09:27 AM
|
5.3
|
40.0
|
||
USGS
|
Xizang-qinghai Border Region
|
Jan 30 09:27 AM
|
5.2
|
37.1
|
||
GEOFON
|
Xizang
|
Jan 30 09:27 AM
|
5.3
|
36.0
|
||
WCATWC
|
Off Coast Of Oregon
|
Jan 30 03:15 AM
|
5.5
|
35.0
|
||
GEOFON
|
Off Coast Of Oregon
|
Jan 30 03:14 AM
|
5.3
|
10.0
|
||
EMSC
|
Off Coast Of Oregon
|
Jan 30 03:14 AM
|
5.3
|
10.0
|
||
USGS
|
Off The Coast Of Oregon
|
Jan 30 03:14 AM
|
5.3
|
10.2
|
||
USGS
|
Philippine Islands Region
|
Jan 30 02:32 AM
|
5.4
|
46.0
|
||
EMSC
|
Philippine Islands Region
|
Jan 30 02:32 AM
|
5.4
|
36.0
|
||
GEOFON
|
Philippine Islands Region
|
Jan 30 02:32 AM
|
5.1
|
32.0
|
||
EMSC
|
Andreanof Islands, Aleutian Is.
|
Jan 30 00:56 AM
|
4.6
|
80.0
|
||
USGS
|
Andreanof Islands, Aleutian Islands, Alaska
|
Jan 30 00:56 AM
|
4.6
|
75.8
|
||
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