Earthquake Centered in VA

[LEGERdeMAIN]

omg...Earthquake update:::::

THE DEAD R ALIVE???

 

[Beorn]

Colorado had a 5.3 last night, largest in like century.

THE RAPTURE IS COMING

I guess all those reprobate husbands married to good christian women will have to fix their own dinners tonight.

 

[Antimony]

Maybe the earth will just break apart.

 

[goats]

Coworker just asked me if I felt the earth quake. i just said 'what earth quake?'.
Up in Toronto we didn't feel much it seems.

 

[ayoitsStepho]

All I received was rain.

 

[jimrckhnd]

I miss all the fun stuff. Really mother nature? You couldn't have pushed this forward just a few weeks???

No kidding. We got jolted a bit here but I really noticed very little. Every good geologist wants to be in a decent earthquake. I'm very disaspointed.

 

[violet_crown]

I wasn't even aware the East Coast could have earthquakes

Any smart person out there know the geological explanation behind this?

 

[Kaizer]

Colorado had a 5.3 last night, largest in like century.

THE RAPTURE IS COMING

 

[Totenkindly]

Windows, doors, and things on wall rattling -- York, PA.

 

[ICUP]

Talked to my mother in SC and nothing happened there.
It's about time you guys on the east side got a little surfin' 'da earth action!

 

[jimrckhnd]

I wasn't even aware the East Coast could have earthquakes

Any smart person out there know the geological explanation behind this?

I can tackle the explanation - smart or not is up to you.

Most quakes take place along "active margins" where plate subduction is taking place - Japan or the northern west coast. The southern to mid west coast is odd in that it has a transverse fault (plates moving past each other instead of one plate getting subducted under another).

However, on passive margins (no subduction) like the US east coast there are old faults dating back from when it was an active margin. These faults are mostly inactive but... sometimes the activate often to due to deroofing/sediment unloading (as the rock above them erodes the compressive forces reduce), sometimes due to isostatic rebound (from the retreat of ice sheets for example) or even drilling or occasionally mining activity. In this case I'm guessing (will have to look at the data as it comes out in the weeks and months ahead) that and old fault reactivated pretty close to the margin of the piedmont and coastal plain. My money is on erosonial forces finally allowing a fault to reactivate. It may be a reverse fault - in which case the accumulation of sediment on the coastal plain may have had a role.

 

[PuddleRiver]

Felt it in central WV. This is a first.

 

[Patches]

DEVASTATION IN WASHINGTON DC:

 

[Southern Kross]

DEVASTATION IN WASHINGTON DC:

LMAO

I was thinking the along the same lines. My country is still trying to recover from a couple of serious quakes, so forgive me if I'm not super impressed.

However, I do realise they're pretty rare in Eastern North America and it's probably pretty exciting and dramatic for those who live there.

 

[MacGuffin]

Next up!

Hurricane!

 

[MacGuffin]

My country is still trying to recover from a couple of serious quakes, so forgive me if I'm not super impressed.

However, I do realise they're pretty rare in Eastern North America and it's probably pretty exciting and dramatic for those who live there.

Hey now, our 5.8 isn't too far from your 6.3!

 

[Totenkindly]

Hey now, our 5.8 isn't too far from your 6.3!

Well, it's logarithmic, right? I mean, not too far, but further than it might seem.

From wiki:

The expression Richter magnitude scale refers to a number of ways to assign a single number to quantify the energy contained in an earthquake.

In all cases, the magnitude is a base-10 logarithmic scale obtained by calculating the logarithm of the amplitude of waves measured by a seismograph. An earthquake that measures 5.0 on the Richter scale has a shaking amplitude 10 times larger than one that measures 4.0.

So it's still five times larger amplitude than ours.

 

[MacGuffin]

Well, it's logarithmic, right? I mean, not too far, but further than it might seem.

From wiki:


So it's still five times larger amplitude than ours.

Don't go using facts!

 

[Totenkindly]

Don't go using facts!

Sorry.

"OMG THE GODS ARE ANGRY AT US AND WILL SMITE US DEAD NEXT TIME OUR NATION REFUSES TO LISTEN REGARDLESS OF ANY SILLY OL' SCALE!"

 

[MacGuffin]

Better.