San Andreas fault 'locked, loaded and ready to roll' with big earthquake, expert says

[Blade Wolf]

so that shitty movie is about to become reality?

[ro9ue]

Didn't this already happen and The Rock saved California? Or at least the girl with the big boobs.

[Wildtree]

Not really. Off hand Oregon, Washington and Alaska are all subject to similar magnitude earthquakes. In fact they are subject to potential 9.0 or higher magnitude events from the offshore subduction zone.

And neither one is in imminent danger.
As for Cali, the Bay area has a probability of 67% for a major EQ to happen in the next 30 years, South Cali has a 60% probability.
That means, it might very well not happen at all, any time soon in the next few hundred years.
As i said... not denying Cali's unique danger position, after all there are some 10.000 EQs every year, which most are tiny.
But the cry for the big one is just now once again because of the recent magnitude 6.0 - 7.8 along the ring of fire.

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so that shitty movie is about to become reality?

Nope. Cannot happen, period.
Even IF it would blow up at it's maximum force, the magnitude from the movie quake is geological impossible at the fault.

[willtron]

Yup. Maybe we should start fracking around the San Andreas Fault. Induce some seismicity and release some of the tension along the fault so that you get several "small ones" instead of one "big one."

I'm not sure if you're joking and mocking fracking, but it wouldn't work. There is such a vast amount of energy in earthquakes, there would have to be thousands of small earthquakes to reduce the energy. Further more, it would take a hell of an explosion to move the earth. A richter scale 6 for example is about 63terajoules. Thats 6.3x10e+13 joules. And the richter scale is logarithmic, so a 5 wouldn't be 53TJ. It's actually 0.046 TJ. I believe the USGS looked into it, they'll have some stuff kicking around about their research.

But if you were mocking fracking. Hah, because earthquakes and water sets on fire. But hopefully it taught someone.

[Reeve]

I'm not sure if you're joking and mocking fracking, but it wouldn't work. There is such a vast amount of energy in earthquakes, there would have to be thousands of small earthquakes to reduce the energy. Further more, it would take a hell of an explosion to move the earth. A richter scale 6 for example is about 63terajoules. Thats 6.3x10e+13 joules. And the richter scale is logarithmic, so a 5 wouldn't be 53TJ. It's actually 0.046 TJ. I believe the USGS looked into it, they'll have some stuff kicking around about their research.

But if you were mocking fracking. Hah, because earthquakes and water sets on fire. But hopefully it taught someone.

I'm not really mocking, just trying to be amusing. I actually have no problem with fracking, being in one of the industries that makes it possible.

By the by, that 0.046 TJ number you mentioned was a magnitude 3.91 quake, not a 5. A 5 is 2.8 TJ.

It's not totally crazy, tbh. Oklahoma has had 3217 quakes in the past year, many of which were near 4.0 levels. 907 of the quakes in 2015 were 3.0+. Fairview, OK even had a 5.1 this year. You only need 1,000 4.0 quakes to equal a 6.0. And as someone who has lived through a shit ton of 4.0 earthquakes, they're really not a big deal at all. A 6.9 quake however, like the Loma Prieta quake I lived through, can do some serious damage.

I'm not seriously suggesting that we intentionally use fracking (or rather wastewater injection wells) to control seismicity. The political repercussions of that alone would be a nightmare. It was just an amusing throwaway comment.

[Rasulis]

And neither one is in imminent danger.
As for Cali, the Bay area has a probability of 67% for a major EQ to happen in the next 30 years, South Cali has a 60% probability.
That means, it might very well not happen at all, any time soon in the next few hundred years.
As i said... not denying Cali's unique danger position, after all there are some 10.000 EQs every year, which most are tiny.
But the cry for the big one is just now once again because of the recent magnitude 6.0 - 7.8 along the ring of fire.

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Nope. Cannot happen, period.
Even IF it would blow up at it's maximum force, the magnitude from the movie quake is geological impossible at the fault.

I am not sure about the word imminent danger. The Cascadian fault zone is offshore. So we don't have as much data as the San Andreas fault zone. Right now we are worried that San Andreas in southern CA been relatively quiet. Well, the Cascadian fault zone been quiet for a longer time. Not to mention the potential for tsunami. If you look at the USGS Tsunami Inundation maps for Oregon and Washington, it is pretty scary. The entire coast line is dotted with major development. A 100-foot tall tsunami wave will be devastating.

In my opinion, the potential for loss of life and economic damage from the big one going off the Cascadian fault zone or the New Madrid fault zone (another silent fault zone) will make San Andreas look like child's play.