A Quiet End to 2012

Since passing safely through the Mayan apocalypse, the planet, while always a little shaky, has been relatively quiet. No quakes in the above 6.0 red zone among the broken up plates of Earth. The quake list has representatives from all the Pacific boundary spots, some mid-ocean ridge action and as always, transform slipping in the western US. The central Va. quake zone, mercifully, remains quiet and repairs continue (and conclude) as we try and return to a "normal" world.
Louisa Co. HS is gone, a concrete pad, and plans for a new one are moving forward. Thomas Jefferson Elementary School, long down, actually has construction underway in hopes to have students back in the new building in the fall of 2014. The USGS still digs and probes the area looking for signs of past activity and effects from the 8-23-11 quake. Loud booms and unusual shakes still leave us jumpy and nervous, our trust in the stability of the planet shaken so many ways that lovely August day.
But, it's just Earth doing it's thing, get out and enjoy your ride, today on the shaky planet!

Canadian Shaken!!

A 7.7 magnitude quake in Canada's Queen Charlotte Islands seems to have caused little damage other than some minor power outages and 40 seconds of shaking on a few of the isolated islands.  Tsunami warnings were issued for the west coast and Hawaii but no big waves arrived. A 6.3 aftershock occurred later in the day and dozens of aftershocks in the 4 range continue in the region. The Pacific plate is getting squeezed all around and this big slip was just another reminder.
The CentralVaQuakeZone is still quiet but elsewhere in the US shaking continues. Arkansas had a 4.1 quake, must be fracking again... yeah, blowing up inside the earth to get out hydrocarbons couldn't possibly cause any problems. Oklahoma remains on the list, Nevada is shaking and of course, California and Alaska. The usual suspects on the plate boundaries continues slipping and sliding.
With Sandy's arrival we can do without quakes here, but earth is still doing what it does and there's not anything we can do about it but hang on!

A Rather Shaky Planet

The CentralVaEquakeZone is quiet but much of the rest of the planet is shaking. A 7.6 quake in Costa Rica Wednesday leads the list but every day for a couple of weeks the quake list is long and diverse.  Several different areas of Indonesia (of course), aftershocks, after a big quake, continue in the Philippines, dozens of small shakes offshore of the Virgin Islands and one at 5.4, the Aleutians, California, Turkey, on and on and on. The mid-ocean ridges are even doing lots of shifting about - that seems to ultimately be the driving force so I'm guessing things will not be slowing down anytime soon.
But, then guessing about earthquakes...always a bad idea. They will happen and there is not much we can do about it but hang on (although less fracking seems like a good idea) .  We are hoping our zone is calm for another  hundred years or so.

And, Then, Too Shaky!

No surprise that after a few quiet days the shaky planet would get back to the slipping and sliding. An 8.6 quake and an 8.2 aftershock off northern Sumatra on the 11th (and now dozens of aftershocks)  caused major tsunami concerns around the Indian Ocean. The lateral movement of the strike-slip quake didn't move much water and waves were small. Subduction, one ocean plate being forced beneath another chunk of Earth's outer rocky skin is what causes the big water displacement that makes for killer tsunamis. No subduction this time but seismologist are a little shocked at the strength of this strike-slip quake. The warning system around the Indian Ocean put in place after the 2004 Boxing Day quake/tsunami seemed to get out the word around the basin. Good news for Indian Ocean dwellers.
A 6.5 quake in southwestern Mexico and then 6.2 and 6.9 quakes in the Gulf of California along Mexico's Baja Peninsula (Lower San Andreas fault) continue to keep our neighbors to the south on notice of their location on the shaky Pacific Rim. A 6.2 quake in the Drake Passage between South America and Antarctica is just one more reminder of the trembling nature of our planet.
Only a minor, tiny shake here in central Va. that I've been aware of this past week.
Hang on Earthlings!!!

Not Too Shaky!

The last few days have been fairly quiet on the big shaky planet.  A little action on the mid-Atlantic ridge and some of the other new crust creating, diverging boundaries. But, while the names on the list are familiar, the magnitudes and the numbers of quakes are low.
A tiny rumble here in the CentralVaQuakeZone yesterday morning (that didn't make the list) was just another ever present reminder of our new found shaky home.
Hang on, there is nothing but change coming our way!!!!

On Shakes The Earth!!!

The converging boundaries of the Pacific rim draw closer and closer, shrinking that ocean at speeds hard for us to imagine.  Indonesia, Japan, Alaska, Chile, California, Mexico, Virginia...well, Va. is not on the Ring of Fire but the quakes continue here, too.
The new normal for the earthquake list: Virginia. We are still wrapping our heads around our new, oft shaky world. None of us moved here for the earthquakes.
Hope it is still where you are. But, it's a big wild planet and unlikely to do anything but keep spinning and shaking and changing!!
Hang On!!!

Aftershocks That Won't Go Away

1.8 and 1.6 tremblers early Wednesday probably woke few but kept us on edge here in the CVEqZ. The rest of the shaking world brought few surprises; the Caribbean plate is a little antsy, Vanuatu took a 6.7 hit a couple of days ago but mostly the names on the list are no surprise to those who check out the list on a regular basis. No more, no less, just the plate tectonic-ing planet we call home.
Hang on folks!!! There will be occasional shaking!!!

Aftershocks Still With Us

A 2.7 aftershock woke light (or nervous) sleepers early Sunday morning in central Va. as the year of the quake continues here the Central Va. Quake zone. The rest of the planet shakes on, mostly on the plate boundaries where quakes belong and there have been no quakes in the red zone, 6.0 or better, on the list in several days. The aftershocks continue off Honshu as Japan nears the first anniversary of the devastating quake and ensuing tsunami, an event that has changed quake/tsunami awareness and thinking world wide.
Earth rumbles and shimmies on!!!!
Hang on!!

Plate Boundaries and Central Va.

Plotting quakes for the last two days would easily identify the boundaries that the Earth's lithosphere is broken into and identify places that are regular visitors to the quake list. And, then there's central Virginia; far both in time and space from a plate boundary but shaking again. Three quakes yesterday: two @ 2.5 and one @ 2.0 shake us back to our new reality; we live in an earthquake zone.
The Pacific rim, the mid-ocean ridges shift and shimmy on: Japan, Indonesia, Kamchatka, Philippines, Chile, Central America, the Aleutians, Hispaniola, and the most active of all, the Scotia plate, are all on the list, as usual, but Virginia, to our dismay, is back on the list, as well.
Hang on Earthlings!!!

Central Va. Rockin' Again

After nearly a two week xmas/new year break the aftershocks return to the central Va. equake zone. A good rumble and rattle a little after 1 Saturday am (still not on the list), a 1.9 shake about 9:30 Sunday morning and another this morning at 8:09.  The rest of the planet shakes on as well, a 6.6 quake in the Santa Cruz Islands a couple of days ago is the only red on the list but the usual plate boundary locations shimmy on.
Hang on Earthlings!!