Midwestern Fault Zones Are Still Alive

sciencehabit writes "The occasional quakes rattling the New Madrid Seismic Zone, a series of Midwestern faults named for a small town in the Missouri Bootheel, aren't aftershocks of the massive quakes that rocked our fledgling nation more than 2 centuries ago, a new study suggests. In other words, modern-day quakes are signs that the faults in the region are still accumulating stress—and sometimes releasing it as fresh rumblings."

Re:On the other hand

[ackthpt]

From the article ... "But some scientists don't find the team's results convincing."

There were 4 earthquakes along the New Madrid Fault in the 1811-1812 timeframe which ere commented to have rung church bells in Washington DC, as well as modified the course of the Mississippi River. Harder bedrock (unlike all this nice, soft sandstone in the west coast) mean the shock is felt much stronger and further. I think I'd cut them some slack. An 8.0 along the fault would make Loma Prieta (1989) and Northridge (1994) look like picnics.

They should be considered sleeping or dormant, not inactive.

Re:On the other hand

[jbengt]

The current building code in St Louis is written with earthquakes in mind, it's ust that there are a lot of older buildings that are still vulnerable.

Re:Anyway

[riverat1]

I think the 1700 Cascadia earthquake [wikipedia.org] off the Oregon/Washington coast probably qualifies as the largest in recorded history in the continental US. It hit at about 9:00 pm, January 26, 1700 and was an estimated magnitude of 8.7-9.2. (The reason the time is known so accurately is that the tsunami it caused was recorded in Japanese records.)

So obvious

[SuperKendall]

Liar liar well on fire:

What are you, ten?

So sad you can't even do basic Google searches, all of your links have been
debunked [bloomberg.com].

You really will believe anything your masters spoon-feed you, won't you? What a shame that critical thinking has been so totally disabled by the green movement, once you strong and useful, now just a tool to be used by Arab oil interests to stop franking from slowing down the money flow.

I guess you have no interests in stopping the flow of money from the west going to prop up cultures that horribly abuse women and homosexuals. You may as well be casting stones yourself.