• Welcome! The TrekBBS is the number one place to chat about Star Trek with like-minded fans.
    If you are not already a member then please register an account and join in the discussion!

5.1 earthquake in Southern Oklahoma City/Norman

D

Dorian Thompson

Admiral
Admiral
5.1 earthquake in southern Oklahoma metro

Initially it was designated a 4.5, but it was later upgraded. The ground shook for 30 seconds in some places and longer, apparently, at the University of Oklahoma. The epicenter was at Lake Thunderbird, a few miles southeast of Norman at the southern edge of the OKC metro. Apparently the shaking was much more intense to the south and east. I work in the northeast of the metro (which is pretty sprawled out). All I felt was just one little hitch and it was over. I live in the south metro. When I got home my neighbors told me that it shook for 30 seconds in my neighborhood. I had a glass sitting on a shelf attached to the cabinet by my kitched sink. It was shattered in the sink when I got home.

Second largest earthquake in Oklahoma history. That was a 5.5 in 1952. The governor has ordered the bridges around the metro get an inspection for cracks.

This probably would have been bigger news had it not happened on the day the miners were rescued. Not that I'm complaining. :lol: A 5.1 in Oklahoma is a very bizarre occurrence. There's a fault line running under Jones. That's why they get those little tremors from time to time, but the seismologists don't know about any faults near Lake Thunderbird. They're baffled. Fascinated, but baffled.
 
We're used to our shaking coming from the immense swirling winds throwing all manner of fun garbage and debris into our buildings. It ain't supposed to come from the ground. That shit's fucked up. :wtf: I'll take a tornado over an earthquake any day. Now the pundits are saying it might not have been a "natural" earthquake. Get this, they're opining that it was the saltwater injections that go hand and hand with natural gas mining that caused this earthquake. There are precedents in Texas and West Virginia. Just not a 5.1 precedent. This earthquake shouldn't have happened where it did. An epicenter southeast of Norman is nonsequitor.
 
I hope everyone is okay! Along the same vein of what Dorian Thompson is saying, it just doesn't sound right for an earthquake in that area. I know that Ohio doesn't get very many tremblers, even though we're right on top of the New Madrid Fault, but when we do it scares everyone crapless. :lol:
 
I didn't realize you were on top of that fault, J. Allen. Yikes! :eek:

The Meers fault runs through Oklahoma, and the Jones area (and Canadian county) are pretty well known--in geographic seismological academic circles anyway--for being fairly seismically active. Tiny earthquakes and tremors are fairly common in those two places. El Reno, Oklahoma, that had the 5.5 back in 1952, is in Canadian county.

This earthquake, where it was epicentered....if there are faults underneath they haven't yet been located. This quake is a huge question mark of strange.
 
Dorian Thompson said:
I didn't realize you were on top of that fault, J. Allen. Yikes! :eek:
Click to expand...

That was my reaction when I found out. I was in 3rd grade and that was the same year of the Loma Prieta earthquake. I remember saying "I am glad I don't live in California! That looks scary!" and my teacher telling me, "Oh, but John, we live right over a fault line of our own!" I spent all that evening terrified to go to sleep. Thanks teach! :lol:

The Meers fault runs through Oklahoma, and the Jones area (and Canadian county) are pretty well known--in geographic seismological academic circles anyway--for being fairly seismically active. Tiny earthquakes and tremors are fairly common in those two places. El Reno, Oklahoma, that had the 5.5 back in 1952, is in Canadian county.

This earthquake, where it was epicentered....if there are faults underneath they haven't yet been located. This quake is a huge question mark of strange.
Click to expand...
I'm curious to see what they'll find.
 
The mid west has tons of faults and one day will have an earthquake that makes "the big one" in CA look like nothing.
 
Oh yeah, the Madrid fault will level Memphis if it ever wakes up again. Looks like upper Michigan had a quake of its own. It must have for that to have happened.
 
I’m wondering ... for those not from earthquake country, what are your impressions of an earthquake?

I’m from Southern California originally. When asked years ago, I told someone from Long Island that it’s kinda like taking the train into NYC. They didn’t think that was too bad, until I told them that they’re NOT on a train and that it’s the entire region around them that’s shaking. They didn’t like that idea.
 
Dorian Thompson said:
Oh yeah, the Madrid fault will level Memphis if it ever wakes up again.
Click to expand...

It'll clean that dump up if it does.

I heard that there was a really small one in Arkansas a couple of days ago, like a 3.3 or something. The only one I've been in was like a 4.3 and the house just braced and then there was a little bit of a vibration.
 
Reports say the Oklahoma quake was felt in parts of Dallas. Missed me 30 miles south of Dallas, got nada. But I have felt a couple of small rumbles over my 24 years here.
 
There was only one major injury. This poor man in Norman was on a ladder trying to fix his roof and the shaking threw him off. He broke his leg in two places, but he'll recover. I felt only the tiniest of a vibration and I was in the far northeast of the metro while the epicenter was 8 miles off the southwest corner. The OKC metro is far bigger in area than people realize. In area, it's claimed to be the largest city in the world, believe it or not. I felt the 2.0 that was centred in Del City (a suburb) two years ago. It felt as if the house lurched for one second. I thought a plane had flown extremely low over the house on its way to Tinker Air Force Base. I didn't even realize that it had been a quake until my sister called to ask what I thought about the Del City earthquake as it was on the local news. My television was off. :lol:

Seeing as I pretty much missed yesterday and only suffered broken dishes due to the shaking that apparently took place in my neighborhood, I'm not qualified to comment. Truthfully, I'm bummed that I missed it. :lol: The local geologists are saying they believe the increased natural gas production and drilling in Oklahoma for the past two years played a definitive role in the quake yesterday. They reiterated--no known fault line runs under Norman or near Lake Thunderbird, which was the epicenter. No proof as of yet. The Meers fault is nearer to Jones, which has had the rash of tiny tremors for the past 2 years.
 
Akillaprise said:
RJDemonicus said:
Akillaprise said:
This happened in my neck of the woods earlier in the week. Very unusual for Upper Michigan.

The ground shaking and just ripping open is rather odd.
Click to expand...
I get a "content encoding error" when I try to access the page. I've never seen that one before. :rommie:
Click to expand...
Odd, it's working for me. :vulcan:
Click to expand...

For me as well. You might want to make sure that your browser settings are for UTF-8 encoding and not something strange as a result of visiting a site that changed your settings. (TrekBBS seems to use Western/ISO-8859-1.) If you're using Firefox, click on View in your menu, and hover over Character Encoding when you're on the site. Unicode (UTF-8) should be selected. I'm not sure what the equivalent menu option is for Internet Exploder. (No, that's not a typo - I'm a Web developer, and I loathe IE.)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
If you are not already a member then please register an account and join in the discussion!

Sign up / Register


Back
Top