Friday, May 3, 2013

'Geology' report concludes 2011 Oklahoma earthquake caused by drilling, water injection

From:  2Works4U

NOTE:  This event is believed to indicate a reactivation of the Madrid Fault, which caused enormous death and destruction in the MidWest, remembered by the disappearance of the town of Madrid, and shock waves felt as far away as Boston.  


Oil exploration is the cause of an Oklahoma earthquake that damaged a college campus and more than a dozen homes, according to a report released Tuesday.
READ THE REPORT (http://bit.ly/OKgeologyreport)
2NEWS reporter Marla Carter has been covering the story since Nov. 6, 2011, the day of the 5.6 magnitude quake in Prague, Okla.
She spoke with scientists across the country and provided them data, which they say confirmed the earthquake was man-made, possibly caused by an injection well.

Tuesday, the report from the journal 'Geology' linked the quake to an old injection well in Lincoln County. 

The study was quick to point out that the wastewater injection was conducted in traditional drilling, not the polarizing process of hydraulic fracturing, or fracking. 

END OF ARTICLE - SEE LINK FOR VIDEO 

Also of interest, background on the Madrid Fault, and its reawakening 

From:  Wiki  

Madrid Fault 

The New Madrid Seismic Zone (pronounced /nj ˈmædrɪd/), sometimes called the New Madrid Fault Line, is a major seismic zone and a prolific source of intraplate earthquakes (earthquakes within a tectonic plate) in the southern and midwestern United States, stretching to the southwest from New Madrid, Missouri.
The New Madrid fault system was responsible for the 1811–1812 New Madrid earthquakes and may have the potential to produce large earthquakes in the future. Since 1812, frequent smaller earthquakes have been recorded in the area.[1]
Earthquakes that occur in the New Madrid Seismic Zone potentially threaten parts of seven American states: Illinois, Indiana, Missouri, Arkansas, Kentucky, Tennessee and Mississippi.[2]

Potential for Future Earthquakes

In a report filed in November 2008, The U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency warned that a serious earthquake in the New Madrid Seismic Zone could result in "the highest economic losses due to a natural disaster in the United States," further predicting "widespread and catastrophic" damage across Alabama, Arkansas, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Mississippi, Missouri, Oklahoma, Texas, and particularly Tennessee, where a 7.7 magnitude quake or greater would cause damage to tens of thousands of structures affecting water distribution, transportation systems, and other vital infrastructure.[22] The earthquake is expected to also result in many thousands of fatalities, with more than 4,000 of the fatalities expected in Memphis alone.
The potential for the recurrence of large earthquakes and their impact today on densely populated cities in and around the seismic zone has generated much research devoted to understanding in the New Madrid Seismic Zone. By studying evidence of past quakes and closely monitoring ground motion and current earthquake activity, scientists attempt to understand their causes and recurrence intervals.
In October 2009, a team composed of University of Illinois and Virginia Tech researchers headed by Amr S. Elnashai, funded by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), considered a scenario where all three segments of the New Madrid fault ruptured simultaneously. The report found that there would be significant damage in the eight states studied – Alabama, Arkansas, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Mississippi, Missouri and Tennessee – with the probability of additional damage in states farther from the NMSZ. Tennessee, Arkansas, and Missouri would be most severely impacted, and the cities of Memphis, Tennessee and St. Louis, Missouri would be severely damaged. The report estimated 86,000 casualties, including 3,500 fatalities; 715,000 damaged buildings; and 7.2 million people displaced, with 2 million of those seeking shelter, primarily due to the lack of utility services. Direct economic losses, according to the report, would be at least $300 billion.[23]



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