MetaFilter posts tagged with earthquake

Metafilter Mascot in the news again

jokeefe — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 18:39:13 -0800

"Lilly, what did you see on the beach?" John Feher asked his little daughter. “Squid, squid, squid, squid, squid.” she replied. “Why are they here? Why are the squid here? I can’t honestly tell you,” Sgt. Rains said. “I don’t [know] if it’s tied or not to the earthquake.” Giant squid wash ashore in La Jolla.

Photographs of the Excitement of Geotechnical Engineering (Failures)

filthy light thief — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 14:15:26 -0800

Professors Ross W. Boulanger and Dr. James Duncan have put together a Geotechnical Engineering Photo Album, with details of the successes and disasters. The album includes compaction techniques for a highway off-ramp, deep excavation methods, an offshore tank structure, and earthquake hazards of many sorts (mountain landslides, liquefaction damage to ports in Kobe, Japan, surface rupture in Taiwan, and problems with shallow foundations and subsidence in Turkey). (via oi9)

Man-made earthquakes

445supermag — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 08:23:06 -0800

There are worries that a new geothermal project in California may cause earthquakes (nice animation from NYT and here's the full article). These worries are not just theoretical, its happened before... Enhanced Geothermal Systems (dry rock geothermal) are blamed for increased seismicity: "The HDR project in Basel, Switzerland was suspended after it caused an earthquake. On 8 December 2006, only 8 days after water injection started, an event occurred measuring 3.4 on the Richter Scale with the focus at the bottom of the HDR borehole. The eventprompted concern from local residents. Water injection was immediately stopped, but minor events continued. Further tremors were recorded on 6 January (measuring 3.1) and 16 January 2007 (3.2)." Short (12min) video segment from the California PBS science show Quest on geothermal in California (lots of details on EGS and California geothermal).

We Built This City on Sunken Ships

kirkaracha — Mon, 18 May 2009 10:25:50 -0800

Ship to Shore. Much of downtown San Francisco, including everything in this photo, is built on landfill based on sunken ships that were abandoned during the Gold Rush (see the map linked at the bottom of the page). Notes on ships and wharves. 1852 map of downtown. There are markers along the original shoreline. Flickr pool. The ships weren't only used as landfill. The hull of the Arkansas was turned into the Old Ship Ale House. The hull of the Niantic was converted into a hotel. When the Niantic was dug up in 1978, excavators found bottles packed in straw that still contained champagne. The sunken ships occasionally turn up during construction projects. The downtown area is a seismic hazard zone that could liquify during an earthquake. (Much of the Marina is built on landfill based on rubble from the 1906 earthquake.)

Earthquake kills 150, displaces 50.000 in Italy

elpapacito — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 11:04:29 -0800

At least 150 dead, 1.500 injuried and 50.000 displaced by a magnitude 6.3 Richter scale earthquake that struck Abruzzo and center Italy at 01:32:42 UTC on April 6th.The damage is very severe, the little village of Onna, existing since at least year 1178, was completely destroyed and the city of L'Aquila (pop 70.000) was severly damaged. The city hospital was rendered 90% unusable, allegedly 50% of all of the city buildings are now considered unsafe. Hundreds of pictures have been sent on the internet by locals, while controversy ensues on a early warning by an italian scientist (indicted a few days ago for spreading rumors about an upcoming quake), who claims that his Radon gas detectors signaled an anomaly that may have been validated by a more extensive networks of detectors and may have saved lifes.

Operation Arizona Bay

Curry — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 13:06:34 -0800

This morning millions of Southern Californians dropped, covered, and held on as part of The Great ShakeOut. The largest earthquake preparedness exercise in U.S. history simulates a 7.8 quake rocking the southland. At 10 a.m. PST participants were instructed via pre-recorded broadcast (English transcript) to imagine "sudden and intense back and forth motions of up to six feet per second." This drill is part of Golden Guardian 2008, a series of emergency exercises under the direction of Gov. Schwarzenegger and the California office of Homeland Security. Preparing for The Big One is not a matter of if, but when. As sometimes happens during simulated disaster scenarios, the Big Fake One was followed shortly by real tremors.

shake shake shake

fantabulous timewaster — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 08:31:36 -0800

"The Quake-Catching Network is a collaborative initiative for developing the world's largest, low-cost strong-motion seismic network by utilizing sensors in and attached to internet-connected computers." The Economist's writeup notes that, since network communications are (sometimes) faster than the speed of sound in the earth's crust, a distributed network's observations of a temblor might reach a warning network before the quake itself reaches a traditional seismometer. This appears to be the first use of Berkeley's Open Infrastructure for Network Computing as a sensor network, rather than for number-crunching.

Something exploded over and under Lake Huron near the US/Canadian border. Nobody knows what it was.

maxpower — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 12:47:24 -0800

Something exploded over and under Lake Huron near the US/Canadian border on July 31, 2008. Nobody knows what it was. Initial published reports identified the cause as a meteor shower (without attribution). A week later more details emerged and meteors were ruled out. So what was it? The local nuclear plant? The giant underwater salt mine? A series of earthquakes? Military fighter jets? All have been counted out. Pure speculation, but could this strange event be related?

Coco Wang: China 5:12 Earthquake

By The Grace of God — Sun, 01 Jun 2008 13:35:14 -0800

Ten simple, shattering comics about the earthquake in China. Via MoFi.

Grief in the Rubble

homunculus — Sun, 25 May 2008 00:36:54 -0800

Chinese Are Left to Ask Why Schools Crumbled. "A staggering number of students died as schools collapsed in the May 12 earthquake, and grieving parents are speaking out about shoddy construction."

Fifty Thousand Shirts

djspicerack — Sat, 24 May 2008 12:55:59 -0800

Fifty Thousand Shirts. Creative guy Steve Paterson has teamed up with a number of other partners (and is still looking for more) to sell 50,000 t-shirts in memory of the more than 50,000 people who died in China's recent 7.9 magnitude earthquake in order to raise $1,000,000.

An earthquake on your wedding day

spacesbetween — Wed, 21 May 2008 05:59:04 -0800

Wedding photographers captured the exact moments of the earthquake in Sichuan, China. The source of the pictures are hosted on a chinese site, which can be found here. It contains additional photographs.

Earthquake lights

Pater Aletheias — Tue, 20 May 2008 11:02:52 -0800

Until recently, earthquake lights were folklore. It wasn't until the phenomenon was captured in photographs, taken during the Matsushiro earthquake swarm in Japan between 1965 and 1967, that the seismological community acknowledged their occurrence. The precise mechanism is unknown. A stunning example was captured on video thirty minutes prior to the Sichuan earthquake.

Cute but foreboding

NikitaNikita — Mon, 19 May 2008 11:38:02 -0800

Superstitious bloggers explain the recent earthquake in China by suggesting that the official Olympic Mascots of the Beijing Olympics foretold of disaster. It's not the first time these mascots have been scrutinized for hidden meaning. Previously: 1, 2 Alternatively, the migration of toads have been cited as another omen of disaster.

2008 Sichuan Earthquake

b1tr0t — Mon, 12 May 2008 07:23:22 -0800

Newsfilter: Magnitude 7.8 earthquake hits China.

They Moved the Whole Town

netbros — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 17:47:45 -0800

The town of Valdez, Alaska is located in south central Alaska on the northeast tip of Prince William Sound. Incorporated since 1901, the community’s first century has been marked by a number of significant events the most notable of which are the 1964 Alaska Earthquake, being chosen as the terminus of the trans-Alaska Pipeline and the tragic 1989 Exxon Valdez Oil Spill. Earlier this week Rafaelloello gave us a wonderful post about the Alaskan village of Whittier. The Alaskan town of Valdez has a history equally as interesting. During the 1964 Alaska earthquake the North American plate released upward, displacing a huge volume of ocean water and causing a seismic wave, a tsunami, to travel outward. The wave traveled at an estimated 450 miles per hour in the deeper ocean in a long wave of almost imperceptible height. At the shallow Valdez Inlet the wave reached a maximum height of nearly 200 feet. Further on, at the old town of Valdez, a 30 foot wall of water struck and demolished all structures. Twenty eight Valdez residents died when the tsunami crashed ashore. Valdez was later rebuilt at a higher elevation and further from the waterfront. Valdez' distinguishing characteristics are the incomparable rugged beauty of its natural mountain ringed setting and its extremely high average annual snowfall of 360 inches (30 feet) the most of any community at sea level in North America. Valdez’s economy is based on oil, tourism, commercial fishing, shipping/transportation and city and state government. Unfortunately, when most hear the word Valdez, they think oil spill.

George Lawrence and his amazing Lawrence Captive Airship

spock — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 14:00:26 -0800

Motto: "The Hitherto Impossible in Photography is Our Specialty." Meet George Lawrence. Saying that "he took pioneering aerial photographs using kites" doesn't quite do Lawrence Captive Airship justice. Dubbed the Lawrence Captive Airship it utilized a string of seven kites to lift the specially designed cameras to heights of 2,000 ft. Cameras weighing as much as 49 pounds and capable of producing negatives from 10 x 24 inches to a staggering 30 x 87 inches in size. The largest negatives yet taken from any airborne vehicle. He holds a significant place in the History of Remote Sensing, Aerial Photography. See multiple galleries of his aerial photography (scroll down) including his historic shots of (1906) earthquake striken San Francisco.

1988: 50k dead, 2007: 3k-5k still homeless

k8t — Thu, 06 Dec 2007 22:57:15 -0800

19th Anniversary of Spitak Earthquake At 11:41am on December 7, 1988, a 7 point scale earthquake shook the Soviet Republic of Armenia. A massive Soviet-wide aid campaign began. Aid workers from outside of the Soviet Union were allowed in, for the first time in Soviet history. Many argue that the 50,000+ deaths were in part due to poor construction of the Soviet era buildings. Any hope for reconstruction fell apart with the collapse of the Soviet Union though. 19 years later, many people are still living in "temporary" housing, called "Domiks" , estimates are around 3000-5000 people still homeless after 19 years. A child of the earthquake remembers. ABC News coverage and Time Magazine coverage.

Major earthquake in Peru

LMGM — Thu, 16 Aug 2007 08:08:55 -0800

A 7.9-magnitude earthquake hit Peru in the Ica region, south of the capital of Lima. Ica, Chincha and Pisco have been hardest hit, although the pavement rippled in downtown Lima as well. BBC (first link) and CNN have been reporting about 336-7 dead, but my uncle (in Lima) says that many towns south of San Bartolo have simply disappeared into rubble.

Japan suffers major earthquake

dejah420 — Mon, 16 Jul 2007 07:36:50 -0800

Strong earthquake hits Japan, hundreds of homes have been destroyed, bridges have been leveled, tsunamis are forming, and most frightening, the nuclear power plant appears to be leaking radioactive water. The quake registered as a 6.8 on the Richter scale. I hope that our Japanese Mefites are safe and sound and will let us know if there is anything we can do to help.

Speeches. And Herb!

miss lynnster — Wed, 25 Apr 2007 00:00:08 -0800

104 year-old Herb Hamerol was the lone survivor on hand at this year's 101st memorial for the 1906 San Francisco earthquake. To some people he's a celebrity. Truth is, to attend the memorial he took the day off from his long-held job as a stock clerk at Andronico's supermarket. Yes, read that paragraph again.

Real-Time Global Bad News Map

fenriq — Sat, 17 Mar 2007 22:14:46 -0800

The Global Trouble AlertMap
Are you curious about that chemical spill in Minnesota? Or how about the bio hazard situation in Honduras? The Havaria Information Systems AlertMap is updated in (near) real-time and the wealth of bad news is fairly astonishing. Plus they've got RSS feeds for whatever bad (or locationally relevant) news you want delivered. There are USA only maps, Europe only maps and Hungary too (slow day, just a fire). Previously (focused on bird flu tracking though several comments note how freakin' cool the map is)

Earthquake Alert by SMS

SuperNova — Mon, 12 Mar 2007 17:15:43 -0800

You may have heard of Twitter, a social networking utility to let your friends know online or by SMS what you're doing right now. Well, now even fault lines can do it, thanks to some enterprising developers. Friend one of these guys to get San Francisco quake info by text message from the USGS.

The alpha nail

jaimev — Tue, 28 Nov 2006 09:15:36 -0800

"This is a major innovation...and in places that are affected by high winds and earthquakes, it looks like it's going to make a big difference." And it only adds about $15 to the cost of an average 2000 sq. ft. house - the Bostich HurriQuake nail.

6.6

NemesisVex — Mon, 16 Oct 2006 09:07:38 -0800

A 6.6. magnitude earthquake hit Hawaii on Sunday. The quake originated from 24 miles below the west coast of the Big Island. Mefi's own pzarquon posted photos of Honolulu without power, and there's also a photo pool. AP reports: "Across the state, residents reported little panic, and for some the loss of power meant it was time to sit outside, set up barbecues and talk with friends and neighbors."