Magnitude 8.8 Offshore Maule, Chile

reply to post by warpcrafter


I know there's going to be many aftershocks. Hopefully the damage will not be to extreme.

Death count is up to 17 now. Seems to be steadily climbing.

If I were anywhere near the west coast right now, I would be headed east, fast. I know California has some of the best earthquake building codes on Earth, but who knows how bad it might be?

From reports in Chile some people are claiming to have seen a 4 meter wave, not exactly sure where. I did see someone of authority say that anyone near the coast should go to higher ground.

[edit on Sat Feb 27th 2010 by TrueAmerican]

Originally posted by ventian
Death count is up to 17 now. Seems to be steadily climbing.

Source?

.................

Apparently, another aftershock has occurred and an Earthquake in Japan



WTF?

The waves should be hitting anytime off this quake. I have a strong feeling we will be seeing many more quakes this year, and most of them will be huge and cause major damage.

Reported on twitter. The Chilean President has reported a wave has swept into a town.

I'm searching for the source now.

#Mickhodgkin Chile President says huge wave swept into town in S. Chile after earthquake.

[edit on 27-2-2010 by infinite]

reply to post by warpcrafter


California is a very large state, if a earthquake or tsunami did hit it would strike by the coast.

It was on a foxnews alert a few minutes ago. Don't know if it is online.

reply to post by ventian


Most of us are using the tv as the source of our information.

Here is the offical website for tsunami warnings. According to this, there have been several recorded so far:

NOAA website news release

Originally posted by Mr_skepticc
The waves should be hitting anytime off this quake. I have a strong feeling we will be seeing many more quakes this year, and most of them will be huge and cause major damage.

yep, and my theory is that it has something to do with Sun activity... 2012 the Sun will be in its' maximum, this probably means a rough ride for the next couple of years!

I hope I am wrong...

Multiple strong aftershocks in Chile!

I hate to double post but here is some other news around the world.....

earthquake.usgs.gov...

Another good source....translator for these tweets coming out of this region.

trendsmap.com...

Breaking News: Epicenter massive Chile earthquake in conception Most people were asleep. 10 people conf dead. @Danielalo:

reply to post by infinite


According to some reports, there's mass chaos in the streets. Just because we're all cozy in America/Canada/Britain/etc. does not mean this was a minor event. This could be as devastating as the Haiti earthquake, if not worse.

Unfotunately Tsunami waves CAN be affected by localisation aswell as amplification, the same effect happened in the Indian Ocean basin where Coral Reefs were spared due to their terrain, yet we all know what happened to resort towns all along the coastlines.
not forgetting information will be confused at best, comms are down and what 1 person says conflicts with what 10 others also do. The only worrying thing is that 4 hours after the event there hasnt been word that the 4 coastal towns near to the epicentre havent had SAR teams sent yet.

Originally posted by logicalview
Multiple strong aftershocks in Chile!

Thanks for the link, what I was mentioning earlier, just look at the entire fault-line "unzip", known as Fault Rupturing.

Info from developing wiki entry, might want to take a look. 2010 Chile earthquake

The 2010 Chile earthquake happened off the coast of Concepción, Chile[2][3] on February 27, 2010 with a magnitude of what was originally reported to be between 8.3 and 8.5 Mw, and has since been upgraded to a possible 8.8 Mw.[4] It was the strongest earthquake affecting Chile since the magnitude 9.5 1960 Valdivia earthquake, and the strongest earthquake worldwide since the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake.[5] The earthquake was also felt in the Chilean capital Santiago as well as in many Argentinean cities.[6]

Its epicenter was offshore from Maule, approximately 60 mi (97 kilometres) north-northwest of Chillán, Chile and 115 km north-northeast of Chile's second largest city, Concepción.[7] The quake occurred at 3:34 am local time, and is reported to have lasted 10-30 seconds.[8]
Contents
[hide]

* 1 Earthquake characteristics
* 2 Damage and casualties
* 3 Tsunami and aftershocks
* 4 See also
* 5 Notes

[edit] Earthquake characteristics

The earthquake occurred along the boundary between the Nazca Plate and the South American Plate. At the location of this earthquake, the plates converge at 80 mm/year. The coastal part of Chile has a history of great megathrust earthquakes originating from this plate boundary, such as the 1960 Valdivia earthquake. More recently, this plate boundary ruptured at the 2007 Peru earthquake.[7]

The earthquake is characterized by a thrust-faulting focal mechanism, caused by the subduction of the Nazca plate under the South American plate.[7]
[edit] Damage and casualties

According to an Associated Press Television News cameraman, some buildings have collapsed in Santiago and there are power outages in parts of the city.[9]

Chilean television is reporting at least 16 deaths.[1] The Chilean National Emergency Office Oficina Nacional de Emergencia estimated that the intensity of the earthquake was 9 on the Mercalli scale in the Biobío Region and 8 in Santiago.[10] [1]
[edit] Tsunami and aftershocks

A tsunami warning was first declared for Chile and Peru. The warning was later extended to Ecuador, Colombia, Antarctica, Panama and Costa Rica.[1] A tsunami amplitude of up to 1.29 m high was recorded in the sea at Valparaiso, Chile.[1][11] An aftershock of 6.2 was recorded 20 minutes after the initial quake.[1][12] Two more aftershocks of magnitudes 5.4 and 5.6 followed.[12] The USGS said that a large vigorous aftershock sequence can be expected from this earthquake.[7]

Originally posted by ROBL240
This isnt a fault slip, its a fault rupture. Years of the Pacific moving SouthEast has led to this entire length of the faultline being compressed into the Argentina'n plate. The trigger would have been the Japan quake last night which has finally caused this entire section of the fault to "unzip" from just inside the Argentina coastline to 70 miles Southwest out at sea where a 6.9 has just been reported from a new rupture.

If this was a slip event the quakes would be magnitude'd in a singular area, but you can easily see its beginning to unzip on the USGS map.

Argentina could be in some serious trouble!