Magnitude 6.1 ICELAND REGION (prev. 6.7)

Magnitude 6.7 - ICELAND REGION

earthquake.usgs.gov

Linked USGS

I just heard this on BBC news 24 - but on first look could not find article as yet.

Quake occurred at apx 4pm GMT

(visit the link for the full news article)



[edit on 29/5/2008 by Now_Then]

as above so far - will look for more info

edit: depth 10km (shallow) 30 miles SE of Reykjavik - still nothing on the news websites as yet.

earthquake.usgs.gov
(visit the link for the full news article)



[edit on 29/5/2008 by Now_Then]

Showing 6.1 now. Looks like there might be some damage at the epicenter where approximately 6K people live. Neato!

edit: my bad! 6.7 again? No wait. I think USGS is showing both numbers depending on the page.

[edit on 5/29/08 by stikkinikki]

Yeah I have just heard.

Iceland is a very volcanic (I believe)

it is indeed. they generate a lot of power from geothermal plants i hear. hope the damage and casualties are minimal...

[edit on 29-5-2008 by an0maly33]

Could the OP please edit the title for the correct info?

The USGS site has great info on populations and shake intensity:
earthquake.usgs.gov...# maps

Interesting.




Is it just me, or is the world seeing a bit more movement from the plates lately?

[edit on 29-5-2008 by johnsky]

Did everyone forget about Quake Watch 2008?

www.abovetopsecret.com...

Even if it was a 6.7, it is not all that major to warrant a thread, imo, but whatever gets you off.

Is this normal to be having this many tornadoes and earthquakes?

reply to post by stikkinikki


There you go

I live in the North Eastern US, I was wondering about Tsunami alerts but can't find any info to this effect - any ideas?

reply to post by jhill76


The tornadoes are above average this year for sure, but I was actually wondering about the earthquakes myself.

I notice from the USGS maps that the islands off of Alaska seem to have ALOT of activity. Is that normal also? I don't watch earthquake activity much. If Yellowstone goes off, we'll know immediately and get going south as quick as possible if I'm lucky enough. Other than that, we just don't really have any earthquake activity on Wyoming.

Here is a bit more detail:

news.bbc.co.uk...

The article includes a little footage.

The Faroe Islands were hit by a tsunami, and they don't know what caused it. I wonder if it could be related to this quake somehow? Maybe it caused a landslide somewhere, triggering the tsunami?

The tsunami hit a place called Hvannasund. I haven't found any in english yet, but plenty of danish and norwegian sources.



Berlingske Tidende: Færøerne ramt af lokal tsunami (in danish...)

Bornholms Tidende: Færøerne ramt af lokal tsunami (in danish...)

Aftenbladet: Lokal tsunami rammet Færøyene (in norwegian...)

Fædrelandsvennen: Lokal tsunami rammet Færøyene (in norwegian...)


edit: D'oh! A link wouldn't work. Replaced it with another. Btw, the quake is now listed as a 6.2. The Faroe Islanders says "the ocean is acting up". The Faroe Islands are not that far from Iceland.

[edit on 2008/5/29 by Hellmutt]

We seem to be having a lot of tectonic plate activity this year, and wierd weather patterns tornadoes in California, earthquakes in the midwest, etc. I think we may be in for something big soon. There seems to be a lot of unusual animal behavior reported recently also, animals sense when things like this are going to happen. It would be a good idea to keep an eye on animal actvity.


For anyone that's interested in the unusual animal activity here's the link.


www.abovetopsecret.com...


Also if anyone comes across any articles that mention unusual animal behaviour in Iceland prior to the quake can you please post a link in the unusual animal behaviour thread, Thanks.

Originally posted by jhill76
Is this normal to be having this many tornadoes and earthquakes?

Iceland will always have seismic activity - it's built up entirely through volcanic action. it also happens to be on top of the mid Atlantic ridge, so earthquakes are not to be unexpected.

Over the past 500 years, Iceland's volcanoes have erupted a third of the total global lava output. Although the Laki eruption in 1783 had the largest eruption of lava in the last 500 years, the Eldgjá eruption of 934 AD and other Holocene eruptions were even larger.

Source

According to wikipedia, it is also apparently a possible site of a hotspot as well as the ridge. All this basically implies that there is nothing extraordinary about a quake there whatsoever.

And from a BBC link further up the page:

A spokesman for Iceland's Institute of Earth Sciences said the country had been expecting further quakes after a series of tremors in the same area in 2000.

reply to post by RabbitChaser

Did everyone forget about Quake Watch 2008?

www.abovetopsecret.com...

Even if it was a 6.7, it is not all that major to warrant a thread, imo, but whatever gets you off.

Uhmm.. Since when can you create 1 thread and decide that all quake information must go on that thread? I mean I am not knocking it..it has its place... but giving someone else crap on thier post just because you have started another thread somewhere seems rude to me..I am going to start a UFO 2008 thread.. all UFO post must go there....


[edit on 30-5-2008 by ats1629]

reply to post by ats1629


It's fine to have posts in the News section for ones which people see as unusual, or large.

It doesn't really matter that there is some duplicate information, in case no one noticed there are often different posts in different boards about the same thing, if from a different angle. Like this one is more "Wow, an earthquake in Iceland" and the Quake watch thread is like "hmm, one in Iceland"

And Hellmutt, can you offer a better idea of the translation than google can for this article?

All I get is:

The local færøyske the Directorate for Energy and the geology is warning residents of the village to go down to the fjord.

On Wednesday afternoon began the sea in the fjord in Hvannasund to cradle sharply back and forth, despite the fact that the weather was fine and without that there was any wind in the area. Up until then had been the fjord blikkstille.

Over the next hour rock sea higher and higher, and at a time traveled the sea more than 3 meters above kaikanten. Boats were thrown against the wharfside, and when the sea pulled back, could see the seabed where the fish lay and flop.

-- We do not know what happened. Atfydd there has been a major fjellskred in the area that has fallen down on the large depth, "says Lis Mortensen, head of department and naturgeograf in the Faroe Islands directorate for energy and geology.

-- However, more men have been in the area of the boat just before it began, and no one has noticed something fjellskred, "she says. The Directorate, therefore, set up research to clarify the incident.

Mortensen reports that she has heard about a similar case in the early 1950s.

The population warned against going down to the fjord, because the sea began to rock again a few hours after the first, powerful incident was over. Also, several other locations north of the Faroe Islands, it is reported about the powerful waves in the sea on Wednesday afternoon.

Bad English into English would suggest it means, they are warning locals not to go into the Fjord, due to the conditions. The sea began to get rougher, on Wednesday afternoon, and got higher, and when it receded the seabed could be seen.

What "Atfydd there has been a major fjellskred in the area that has fallen down on the large depth, " means I'm not sure, but I assume a landslide.

So the description definitely fits a tsunami, but the description suggests it took a while, but I suppose that could happen, depending on the cause.

Originally posted by apex

Atfydd there has been a major fjellskred in the area that has fallen down on the large depth

I don't know where the word "Atfydd" comes from, it's neither english nor norwegian...

Anyway, "Muligens har det vært et stort fjellskred i området som har falt ned på stor dybde" translates to: "There might have been a huge landslide in the area, sliding into deep waters". Or something similar...