New Activity at Mt. Rainier Confirmed to Be Seismic (...or ICE?), Right here on ATS!

reply to post by TrueAmerican


Thanks TA!

2nd

A post from my Washington State thread:

Helens is feeling a bit left out. We've been paying lots and lots of attention to Rainier for the past month. Although....while this is in the helens seismic zone, it sits almost smack dab in between helens and Rainier.

MAP 1.1 2012/01/25 16:40:24 46.405 -122.268 16.7 17 km ( 11 mi) S of Morton, WA
MAP 1.2 2012/01/25 11:22:38 46.340 -122.234 8.8 16 km ( 10 mi) NNW of Mount St. Helens Volcano, WA
MAP 3.4 2012/01/25 10:51:30 46.340 -122.236 8.9 16 km ( 10 mi) NNW of Mount St. Helens Volcano, WA

Magnitude 3.4
Date-Time Wednesday, January 25, 2012 at 10:51:30 UTC
Wednesday, January 25, 2012 at 02:51:30 AM at epicenter
Time of Earthquake in other Time Zones

Location 46.340°N, 122.236°W
Depth 8.9 km (5.5 miles)
Region WASHINGTON
Distances 16 km (10 miles) NNW (345°) from Mount St. Helens Volcano, WA
24 km (15 miles) S (172°) from Morton, WA
28 km (18 miles) SE (138°) from Mossyrock, WA
60 km (37 miles) ENE (68°) from Longview, WA
84 km (52 miles) NNE (20°) from Vancouver, WA

Location Uncertainty horizontal +/- 0.3 km (0.2 miles); depth +/- 0.4 km (0.2 miles)
Parameters Nph= 48, Dmin=2 km, Rmss=0.18 sec, Gp= 76°,
M-type=local magnitude (ML), Version=5
Source Pacific Northwest Seismograph Network

Event ID uw60389576

source


Blog on PNSN about the quake

reply to post by westcoast


Measly looking seismogram on that blog. The IRIS DMC one is SO much prettier.

B201.PB..EHZ.2012.025

What a little cracker!

ETA: I know you all love foreshocks so here is a couple of foreshocks for that one. Almost in the same spot - a mag 1.0 and a mag 1.8 B201.PB..EHZ.2012.023 6th and 7th items on this list. There was another, no 5 on the list but that was south of MSH.

The Cascade Mountains are rumbling. Mt Saint Helens had a 3.4 earthquake 10 miles to the North. As reported here on ATS Mt. Rainier showing signs of seismic activity. As a Washington resident I hope neither of these mountains blow their top!

deathby1000papercuts.com...

Well, I for one am done with this. Through conversations with PNSN, I have become aware of some things that I didn't know. For one, they DID try and put some temporary GPS and seismic stations up there, and they are quite aware of the deficiencies of the coverage. Way more than we will ever know. But priority, cost, and a few other things (like Park restrictions and incredibly bad weather) play a part in the answer as to why there is not better coverage.

It's a damn hard place to work. Easy to be the armchair seismologist, but getting out there and doing it, is a whole other matter.

And I will add one last comment, to help ease any concerns over Rainier potentially erupting. I am not going to say it won't; that would be foolish. But one simple saving grace here is that should any kind of tremor, harmonic or otherwise occur at Rainier, the fact that the stations are in rock, and the issue of powerful wave propagation in the 2 to 10 Hz region cannot be masked by ice, any such tremor would be easily detected. Fear not, my friends. These guys working on it are some of the best there are. And they don't want to die, either. Thanks for all the comments, but I hearby CEASE any assertion that the icequakes are anything other than that.

I researched it, talked to the experts, and have come to that conclusion for myself. I am very satisfied from talks behind the scenes that it is being covered not only appropriately, but with vast experience and concern.

Take from that what you will, but I have no further reason, at this point, to continue this debate.

reply to post by TrueAmerican


ALL RISE...........! This party is over.......was fun while it lasted.

Over and out!

reply to post by TrueAmerican


Thanks TA.....I'll keep watching, like I have always have. I agree with you on the people behind the scenes. They are professionals and I respect their opinions. That doesn't change the fact though that they reall don't know. This has gone on for over a month now without any sign of letting up...in fact, it continues to increase (IMO)

SO....If i see anything especially brow-raising, I'll be sure to send you and PM a message. And you can always find me on my Washington State thread.

Originally posted by westcoast
That doesn't change the fact though that they really don't know.

Well true in a sense, but perhaps it is really more like "they are reasonably sure, with a high degree of confidence, that they are icequakes." Scientists love to qualify their uncertainty. And in this case they are pretty darn certain. But hey, we all learned something in this thread, didn't we?

Mission accomplished.

Regardless of the nature of these quakes, be they seismic or icequakes, we are seeing science in action, and that is certainly exciting. Thank you TrueAmerican, and Westcoast, and all other contributors for making this a wonderful thread

Originally posted by PuterMan
reply to post by westcoast

 

helicopter

helicopter......schmellicopter. Never in a month of sundays does a helicopter make a gliding sound like that at 11 Hz. Nor does a helicopter take 6 minutes or more to do a pass, and if it was hovering the sound would not vary.

(Of course I could be wrong - nah perish the thought)

ETA: Last thought before I close down. The helicopter signal they show looks like a shortened version of the trains, which is exactly what I would expect, and the trains sounded NOTHING like this sound. The harmonic may be from the glacier. I am not saying it is magmatic HT, but HT it is.

edit on 24/1/2012 by PuterMan because: (no reason given)

Having now spent many hours on this I have to stop and do some other stuff.

I have found this signal elsewhere. Nothing like RCS which is far and away the strongest signal, but it can be seen/heard on UW.RCM and CC.PANH and CC.OBSR

The spread of time over the 4 stations is large – from the earliest @17:28 UTC to the latest @23:45. That is a mighty long time for a Chinook to be flying about! I would not want the bill for that.

The times are similar but not exact and I have no idea how fast HT would travel through rock but I as guessing that it would be nowhere near as fast as a P or S wave so I cann't make any comparison there. One set at RCM and PANH coincide timewise, but the PANH set goes on much longer. RCM is 17:46 to 17:57 and PANH is 17:45 to 18:35. RCS also comes in on this on at 17:55 to 17:58 and again from 18_07 to 18:21.

This could possibly be consistent with a helicopter flying around, but unfortunately there is not correlation at all that I can see with the other times.

The other problem is that for RCM to be the earliest signal @17:28 there is no way that could happen unless the aircraft came in from the SE. If the base for the Chinook is SE of Rainier than that may prove a point except that the last appearance is @23:54 on CC.OBSR and that is NW which is not consistent with the potential approach as to exit to base the aircraft would have to cross over the other seismos when flying SE. There is no occurrence of the signal on RCS at the start indicating a fly over on exit to the SE

Start End Station
17:28 17:33 RCM
17:45 18:35 PANH
17:46 17:57 RCM
17:55 17:58 RCS
18:07 18:21 RCS
18:47 18:50 OBSR
19:12 19:16 RCM
21:15 21:55 PANH
21:43 21:44 RCS
22:20 22:28 PANH
22:22 22:28 RCS
22:31 22:34 RCS
23:45 23:54 OBSR

Weird sort of search pattern. Not a standard ASR Box Search.

Frequency wise they are all pretty much the same. There are some slight variations, some of which are closer to the slightly lower MSG sound.

By the way the 22.5 Hz signal seems to be consistent in the area and when cleaned is pretty much continuous.

Due to the month of Sundays just passed I am going to say that maybe it is the signal from a helicopter, in the absence of any other information, but that the timings and apparent search pattern are all wrong for a professional search and a Chinook has to be a professional search.

I would point out that PNSN initially said "that does look strange, sometimes station noise and problems with telemetry can cause gliding spectra like that" - in other words they did not have a clue. (And no they don't cause gliding. That is either HT or Chinook helicopters )

My biggest problem with all this is that due to the virtually identical signature at MSH this calls that sound in to question. Was that also a Chinook. Since it was June when the recording was made perhaps it was. This was just before the emergence of the first dome, that was subsequently blown apart.

Of course I could be wrong - nah perish the thought

I am not convinced by their argument, but it has some merits. At the end of the day it is still harmonic tremor in the strictest sense since it is a tremor and exhibits harmonics. I will accept that I may be wrong in this instance as to the source which I thought was the glacier, and in future will know exactly what this is when I see it. "It's a Chinook. Nothing to see here".

Just one final point here. Having now listened to several days of seismos - full 24 hour periods - I am convinced that there is some seismic activity in there amongst all the other pops and bumps.

reply to post by westcoast


By the way I have a download set up for RCS, RCM. RER and STAR along with GPW which happen every day now.

You can also get instant access to the IRIS version of these and other stations including PANH and OBSR on this page

There is a link for today and yesterday for each station.

reply to post by TrueAmerican

but I hearby CEASE any assertion that the icequakes are anything other than that.

Who told you off TA? Who got at you?

Interesting comment that considering some of the quakes definitely are seismic in my humble opinion (longer signal) and the fact that PNSN themselves said it is not possible to tell accurately, thus some of them indeed could be.

Can someone help me pinpoint this activity? RCS Rainier
I know we said we were done with this, but it looks interesting. Local area around the mountain, perhaps?

ETA: Sorry, um around 16:20:40UTC. It doesn't seem to be from south of the mountain, closer to MSH, and I don't think this is an icequake.



Here is a thumbnail from STAR: rockfall? small avalanche?

Yeah, I'm stubborn. It looks like there was a rumble closest to RCM -- Camp Muir while I hopped in the shower.

Here is a look on iris.


Just more snow/rock/ice adjustments?

PM, no one told me off except me, I promise.

I already assessed two things which we seem to agree on:

1) There are some seismic signatures in the middle of all this. But they are few compared to the icequakes.

2) That signature wasn't magmatic HT. I was surprised that you went and seriously tracked it down, but compliments to your persistent nature when something doesn't make sense. For me it just didn't match any MHT (Magmatic HT) I have seen so far. Doesn't mean it couldn't be, but I really didn't want to spend that much time trying to prove the point.

Like you, my peers here expect a certain amount of diligence when assessing things. Because if I don't maintain that level of diligence, no one is going to give a darn about a stinking thing I say. And they probably don't already! But at least I promise to try, not necessarily my best every time, but at least beyond mere speculation.

And I have. I don't know what more I can do. I have taken all input, including yours, and there's, and everyone's, and mine, and reached a conclusion. Some will follow, trusting my opinion and research in the matter, and some won't.

But one thing that is clear, is that not a single one of us has the resources, experience, and in situ reference points that the PNSN does to assess these quakes. And that matters. It matters a whole lot, actually.

And now I must make another choice. And I am going to make it publicly, right here, and right now. Because it is fair to reveal this information, in my opinion, so that everyone knows.

The PNSN, as well as several other seismic networks, are very well aware of ATS and the things we discuss. I will not speculate as to the reasons they may, or may not, participate anonymously. Of that I have no clue.

But it is important to note this. They may not value our opinions, or they might. I don't know. But at least they are responsive. And that matters a whole lot too. No one's hiding much of anything. So I am not going to hide that fact anymore either.

So please, be responsible, and respectful, and I say that to all- and especially myself. While ATS is just sheer fun to us, assessing something as important as the status of Rainier IS in the hands of experts. And let me tell you folks, you all better be DARN GLAD, that it is.

We've got their opinion, and as best I am able to tell to the extent of my capabilities, I agree with them.

But hey, please, have at it. I am happy to entertain further observations. And you know what? They are too. The door is cracked half open. Knock with some pertinent questions, and you will likely get answers.

reply to post by TrueAmerican

And now I must make another choice. And I am going to make it publicly, right here, and right now. Because it is fair to reveal this information, in my opinion, so that everyone knows.

The PNSN, as well as several other seismic networks, are very well aware of ATS and the things we discuss. I will not speculate as to the reasons they may, or may not, participate anonymously. Of that I have no clue.

TA - you, me and most all of here that follow earthquakes and volcanoes know this - we learned this in the Yellowstone Thread long ago. I think it is a wonderful thing actually. We do it as a passion and while it may have started as a passion for Them, They are on a payroll - There is a difference. Isn't science all about bouncing theories about until you find the answer? They help Us, and, We help Them Why does this have you bugged out now? To me it's all good!

reply to post by Anmarie96


Well great! I was never all that sure about that. But I am now.

And it's no big deal. For all we know one person from any of the networks, stops in once a year. I have no idea to what extent they are on ATS, and to what extent they may follow any given thread. Or even if any of them might be members.

I just wanted to make the point, so that some measure of respect IS shown to them in responses. On the other hand, they may enjoy getting pummeled, laughed at, and heckled. Heck if I know. Seriously, I don't. Responses from "them" are very direct, straight to the point, with any fat pretty well trimmed to just about zero.

I've said it before, and I can repeat it here: From my interactions with them, scientists have no time for politics- at least from what I've experienced. And there's an important lesson in that, somewhere.

reply to post by TrueAmerican

I just wanted to make the point, so that some measure of respect IS shown to them in responses. On the other hand, they may enjoy getting pummeled, laughed at, and heckled.

Aw, I enjoy poking fun at the scientists! As you are aware I often talk about USGS having earthquake 'sales' - reducing the magnitude after 7 days. I am sure there are reasons for this, and as a programmer I can envisage scenarios where this might happen - but I still like to pull their leg about it.

On the other hand I think I know enough about the mechanics of earthquakes and seismograms/graphs to fend of accusations of HAARP and of 'removing' quakes from the lists and have 'defended' the scientists many times on this score.

At the end of the day they are human like us and can make mistakes and it does no harm at all if we keep them on their toes. It also does no harm if we poke a bit of fun as well, and if they take offence then as far as I am concerned they can go and do the other because they are not Gods to be revered. Science is about being open and honest. Unfortunately certain elements of science have been perverted by politics and science in general is being tarred with the same brush. The hallowed Halls of Science are at serious risk of losing credibility amongst the general public, and whilst those elements may not think that matters it does.

There are many very clever people out there in the big wide world who are not scientists as such but who have a fantastic grasp of things scientific, Science in general would do well to listen. Any cogent argument on a subject that causes things to be looked at in an analytical manner weighing up all aspects can only be good and is surely the basis for all science.

One has to rib them occasionally, they are after all men in white coats guessing.

Here is one little snap that I am certain is seismic. Mag 1.6 Mag 0.9 It looks to be located just E of Point Success and just S of the East Crater, near the top of the volcano, 1.4 km 2.0 km deep.


ETA: Sheesh, revised down from Mag 1.6 to 0.9. Depth also lowered to 2.0 km. They show a Mag 0.5 aftershock a little deeper @ 2.5km. Have to see if it is revised lower by half.

reply to post by Olivine


Thanks for that. So at this point, it's probably fair to say that Rainier has the usual, low level background seismicity, no magmatic tremor of any kind present, and icequakes doing their usual thing. For anyone looking for a conclusion to the thread title, that's about all I got.

And PM, kidding around and poking jabs at scientists, safe behind the wall of a computer- that's all good-

But once you start actually talking to them, and then they help you freely, and with very valuable info, but keep you at an arms length sort of too, it puts you in a curious position. So I am starting to reconsider my own public policy. I value those resources, very dearly. So I'm going to ease up a bit, if it's all the same to you. Of course I say that, but we'll see. I want to try- I'll put it to you that way.