Category Archives: geohazards

Earthquakes of 2018

Posted on January 1, 2019 by Chris Rowan

Just as I did in 2016 and 2017, I thought I’d begin the new year with a look back at the earthquake activity in the last. According to the catalogue maintained by the USGS, the Earth’s ever-grinding tectonic plates produced … Continue reading →

Categories: earthquakes, geohazards, society

Earthquake prediction is a fool’s errand

Posted on May 13, 2018 by Chris Rowan

If you want to make earthquake scientists jumpy, all you need to do is ask, "can you predict the next earthquake?" In fact, any variation on the theme of ‘earthquake’ and ‘prediction’ will do – unless it is one which … Continue reading →

Categories: deep time, earthquakes, geohazards, geology, ranting, society

Magma making earthquakes on Hawaii

Posted on May 5, 2018 by Chris Rowan

Volcanic happenings are afoot on the Big Island of Hawaii. To be clear, Kilauea has been erupting continuously since 1983, but activity has waxed and waned. The last few weeks have definitely seen an uptick in unrest, with inflation and … Continue reading →

Categories: earthquakes, geohazards, volcanoes

Earthquake warning systems are hard, but not having one is worse.

Posted on January 11, 2018 by Chris Rowan

The premise of earthquake early warning systems is simple. An earthquake produces several different kinds of seismic waves that race away from the rupture point. Because they are different kinds of vibrations, they travel at different speeds; and the farther … Continue reading →

Categories: earthquakes, geohazards, geophysics, links, society