Will the Chile earthquake agitate California's Fault?
Feb 28, 2010
in
Earthquake Questions
I currently live in California.
Will this earthquake in Chile effect the fault line in California in which has been overdued for a big earthquake? Intensify it in some way?
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6 comments
Cara S on February 28, 2010 at 11:05 am
The San Andreas fault has plenty of stress all by itself! Be prepared, and then you don’t have to worry. Secure heavy furniture. Have a grab-and-go bag, with a first aid kit, water, etc. Just the day before the Chile quake, Japan had a 7.0 quake off its shore. Basically, ALL the faults around the Ring of Fire zone do interact, but that does not mean that one quake will "cause" another. It just means that we here in SoCal WILL have another quake, and eventually will have a big quake. We are overdue, and we should take all the quakes we keep hearing about (Haiti, Chile) as fair warning to get prepared. Every family should be prepared to be on their own for a week- 4 or 5 days at least. Have water, have canned food. Think about what happens when the electricity, water, and gas are all off. Do you have camping equipment or something similar that you could use? A large water heater – if secured properly – can probably supply water for several days.
By the way, the San Andreas fault is a strike-slip fault. That means that the tectonic plates are moving "Past" each other – not away from. In other words, California is never going to fall off of anything. Part of it, however, is trying to move a bit north from the rest of it.
Statistically, the southern portion of the San Andreas has not had a "major" quake in over 300 years, making it the most dangerous. Other parts of the San Andreas have had major quakes in 1857 and in 1906, although obviously they are still capable of doing great damage. I was in the 1994 Northridge quake, in a little town called Fillmore that was nearly knocked off the map. The kind of force we experienced from that 6.7 was incredible – with flying crayons marking the ceiling and landing 18 ft. from where they started. Nothing was upright after the quake stopped. All the water had come up out of the toilet bowls. All the china, books, pictures, were off the wall. Every chair was overturned, as were my kids bunkbeds. Many houses in our neighborhood came off their foundations, and chimneys broke off at the roofline at every turn. Don’t mess around. Be prepared.
Darlene on February 28, 2010 at 11:05 am
i live in california too. and believe me… nothing like that is going to happen.
Top Cat on February 28, 2010 at 11:05 am
You never know, but i did hear that if there ever was a big earthquake in California a piece of it would break off.
Guy Richie on February 28, 2010 at 11:05 am
Nope
BTW MSNBC says death toll is now about 254…
Plz help the survivors of the chile earthquake and Hawaii tsunami.
Visit here and make a difference
http://hawaiitsunami.tk/
Anita Fieldman on March 15, 2010 at 4:10 am
Chile’s earthquake involved different plates. More from USGS:
Does the recent earthquake activity in Chile, Haiti, the western Pacific, and the Indian Ocean mean that one earthquake is triggering the next? Probably not. Instead, as illustrated at right, the global rate of earthquake energy release shows little if any difference between times when very large earthquakes have been common and times when they have not. See http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/eqinthenews/2010/us2010tfan/#summary for the rest of the information.
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