Philippine Quake

On October 12 , 2016 in the Philippines, they experienced a medium magnitude earthquake. The earthquake was in an area most commonly referred to as Tingloy. This earthquake had a 5.2 magnitude. The town of Tingloy  experienced no major damage , but the definitely felt the shake. Tingloy is a town in Batangas, Philippines that consist of 17,919 people.  Tingloy off the southwest coast of Batangas mainland. This town has a land area of 14 miles and has rugged hills and some sloping mountains.

The Earthquake in the Philippines that happened recently was a 5.2 quake at 13N and 121E. This quake is centered in Batangas, near Tingloy, and it happened on October 12, 2016. The earthquake occurred at a depth 137km.  There have been no major injuries or damage from this earthquake currently. For the area, this earthquake is considered to be light or moderate.

This earthquake happened along the Philippine Sea Plate, an active plate made up of convergent boundaries. A plate being converging on various sides is unusual, but not impossible. This plate has the Pacific plate subducting under it, and it is subducting beneath the Eurasian plate. This results in quite a bit of earthquake activity, and sometimes can cause things like tsunamis.

Today on earth, we will be looking at a recent earthquake from around the world.  The Philippines were rocked with a nice sized 5.2 earthquake, which compares to our earthquake that hit a little too close to home around five years ago. Our 5.8 quake was 5 times bigger and 8 times stronger than the 5.2 quake that happened today, as reported by the USGS (US geologic survey), however theirs was still a mediocre shake. The town of Tingloy was hit the hardest, and the earthquake hit a little off the coast, which makes sense considering the Philippines are on an convergent ocean boundary.

Kami.com reported that other than the mild thunderstorms they have been getting lately, a quake here was not uncommon, however the epicenter was 7km off of the coast and very close to an iconic tourist and vacation destination, Puerto Galera, which could make some peoples vacation a little different, definitely something they won’t soon forget.

The damage sustained by the quake registered as a VI-VII. A VI quake on the Mercalli scale means that it was felt by all, and frightened many, some heavy furniture was moved, slight damage. A VII on the Mercalli scale means that there was some visible damage in poorly built structures, slight damage in the average house, and some chimneys fell. PHIVOLCS, which is the Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology pinpointed the exact epicenter, which was closest to Mindoro in Abra de long, a 2nd class town with a population of roughly 30,000 people.

On August 8, 1976 an 8.0 magnitude earthquakes hit the philippines a little past midnight. (The highest magnitude earthquake ever recorded in the philippines.) The epicenter was in the Moro Gulf. The earthquake produce a tsunami 4 to 5 meters high. The tsunami covered about 700 km of coastline. It wasn’t the earthquake that killed most people. It was the tsunami no one saw because it was dark. The earthquake and tsunami killed 8,000 people and injured 10,000 people. It all left over 90,000 people homeless.