7.7 Magnitude Quake Hits British Columbia

schwit1 writes "A magnitude 7.7 earthquake hit Canada's Pacific coast province of British Columbia on Saturday night, the U.S. Geological Survey reported. The quake was centered 123 miles south-southwest of Prince Rupert at a depth of 6.2 miles. 'Earthquakes Canada said the quake in the Haida Gwaii region has been followed by numerous aftershocks as large as 4.6 and said a small tsunami has been recorded by a deep ocean pressure sensor. 'It was felt across much of north-central B.C., including Haida Gwaii, Prince Rupert, Quesnel, and Houston. There have been no reports of damage at this time,' the agency said in a statement on its website.'"

Comments

Re:About 1% of the energy of the Japanese earthqua

[Freddybear]

A 6.2 is still a pretty damn big earthquake. Any quake above a 5.0 can be very destructive if it hits in a populated area where building codes aren't up to earthquake-resistant standards.

Re:About 1% of the energy of the Japanese earthqua

[tp1024]

There have been 5 tsunami warnings of some description stemming from 5 different earthquakes in the pacific area within the last 30 days alone.

http://ptwc.weather.gov/

Re:About 1% of the energy of the Japanese earthqua

[Maow]

There have been 5 tsunami warnings of some description stemming from 5 different earthquakes in the pacific area within the last 30 days alone.

http://ptwc.weather.gov/

Fair enough, but they have not been "fearmongering". Plus it's better to have warnings that don't pan out than no warnings at all.

To quote one of the warnings, for a 7.1 magnitude from Queen Charlottes / Haida Gwai (emphasis added):

TSUNAMI INFORMATION STATEMENT NUMBER 1
NWS PACIFIC TSUNAMI WARNING CENTER EWA BEACH HI
521 PM HST SAT OCT 27 2012

TO - CIVIL DEFENSE IN THE STATE OF HAWAII

SUBJECT - TSUNAMI INFORMATION STATEMENT

THIS STATEMENT IS FOR INFORMATION ONLY. NO ACTION REQUIRED.

AN EARTHQUAKE HAS OCCURRED WITH THESE PRELIMINARY PARAMETERS

      ORIGIN TIME - 0504 PM HST 27 OCT 2012
      COORDINATES - 52.9 NORTH 131.9 WEST
      LOCATION - QUEEN CHARLOTTE ISLANDS REGION
MAGNITUDE - 7.1 MOMENT

EVALUATION

BASED ON ALL AVAILABLE DATA A DESTRUCTIVE PACIFIC-WIDE TSUNAMI IS
  NOT EXPECTED AND THERE IS NO TSUNAMI THREAT TO HAWAII. REPEAT. A
  DESTRUCTIVE PACIFIC-WIDE TSUNAMI IS NOT EXPECTED AND THERE IS NO
  TSUNAMI THREAT TO HAWAII.

THIS WILL BE THE ONLY STATEMENT ISSUED FOR THIS EVENT UNLESS
ADDITIONAL DATA ARE RECEIVED.

Re:About 1% of the energy of the Japanese earthqua

[djmurdoch]

There's only one "warning" on that page, the one from last night's earthquake. The others are "information statements" and "information bulletins".

Now, if you want to say that people should not treat every mention of the word "tsunami" as a warning to evacuate, you'd be right. But you said they should ignore the hundreds of "warnings", and there haven't been hundreds of "warnings". There's just been one in the last month. (I think there were others this year, but I can't find a list of all of them.)

Re:About 1% of the energy of the Japanese earthqua

[qubezz]

Look harder: I had to edit this down because of slashcode complaints of "junk characters"

MEASUREMENTS OR REPORTS OF TSUNAMI WAVE ACTIVITY

REPORTS OF 4FT OSCILLATIONS CONTINUING AT WAILOA HARBOR NEAR HILO
ON THE BIG ISLAND

HILO HAWAII 0.37M / 1.2FT 16MIN
KAWAIHAE HAWAII 0.43M / 1.4FT 08MIN
KAHULUI MAUI 0.76M / 2.5FT 12MIN
HALEIWA HI 0.43M / 1.4FT 10MIN
MAKAPU`U HI 0.41M / 1.3FT 08MIN
CRESCENT CITY CA 0.42M / 1.4FT 24MIN
ARENA COVE CA 0.32M / 1.1FT 06MIN

4 feet is enough to turn your nap on the beach into a bad day.