Free Republic

In 2020, one hitherto unknown report accurately predicted what was to follow Biden’s election. It also laid out a plan to preserve democracy in an uncertain future. Weeks before the 2020 election, a secret 87-page document outlined in matter-of-fact language the threat posed by Donald Trump’s still-to-come campaign of election denial. The private paper — the existence of which has not been reported before — forecast with chilling confidence the likelihood of violence during the presidential handover and proposed a far-reaching set of political reforms to thwart Trumpism in the future. Americans remember that dark winter well. But the impetus...

Two people died, 12 were injured and dozens were displaced from their homes in the aftermath of a magnitude 6.4 earthquake that struck off the coast of Northern California and rattled the small towns of Humboldt County early Tuesday morning, officials said. Ferndale, Fortuna, Rio Dell and Scotia were among the towns that felt the most intense shaking. The two people who died were ages 72 and 82, and both had medical emergencies during or after the 2:34 a.m. temblor. They were unable to access timely medical treatment, officials said at a 2 p.m. news conference, according to ABC News...

A team of scientists is reportedly working to obtain the sharpest pictures ever taken of the Cascadia subduction zone – a fault line that runs for seven hundred miles off the coast of the Pacific Northwest. The subduction zone, which has been the site of some of North America's largest earthquakes and the Earth's past "megathrust" earthquakes, has been strangely quiet, with almost no seismic activity detected. To investigate Cascadia's Oregon and British Columbia portion and the reason for this lull, Columbia University led a team of researchers – including students – from the University of Texas Institute for Geophysics,...

Two shallow M5.9 earthquakes hit off the coast of southern Oregon, U.S. at 07:52 and 08:17 UTC on June 4, 2021, at a depth of 16.6 km (10.3 miles) and 14.5 km (9 miles), respectively. They were located around 12 km (7.4 miles) from each other and followed by 5 moderately strong aftershocks over the next 15 hours. 13 M6+ earthquakes have occurred within 200 km (124 miles) in the last 50 years. The largest of which was a M7.2 earthquake on June 15, 2005. These earthquakes occurred as the result of shallow strike-slip faulting within a deformed section of...

The last huge earthquake, the last really “Big One” to hit the Pacific Northwest Coast, struck around 9 p.m. on Jan. 26, 1700 — 321 years ago. Called Cascadia, the magnitude 9.0 quake caused the entire Pacific Northwest coastline to suddenly drop 3 to 6 feet and sent a 33-foot high tsunami across the ocean to Japan. The last huge earthquake, the last really “Big One” to hit the Pacific Northwest Coast, struck around 9 p.m. on Jan. 26, 1700 — 321 years ago. Called Cascadia, the magnitude 9.0 quake caused the entire Pacific Northwest coastline to suddenly drop 3...

Every 14 months, silent earthquakes ever-so-slightly rattle the Cascadia subduction zone, which is capable of producing a magnitude 9.0 earthquake. Now, research shows that these so-called aseismic quakes are tied to fluid moving miles underground. These findings don't affect what we know about the risk of a dangerous quake in the Cascadia region; that information is well-known from the cycle of stress build-up and release during large earthquakes... A better understanding of the aseismic quakes could eventually help bridge the gap in understanding between this well-observed earthquake cycle and the processes happening deep within the subduction zone. The inner workings...

The Cascadia and San Andreas Faults may be linked, with earthquakes on one triggering events in the other "with minimal or no separation in time," scientists have said. Chris Goldfinger and Joel Gutierrez, from Oregon State University, say their evidence showing a relationship between the two goes back almost 3,000 years. The controversial findings, which have not yet been published, will be presented at the American Geophysical Union fall meeting in San Francisco on Friday. The San Andreas Fault forms part of the tectonic boundary between the Pacific and North American Plate. It stretches about 750 miles along the east...

Provocative analysis of sea-floor cores suggests that quakes on the Cascadia fault off California can trigger tremors on the San Andreas. Two of North America’s most fearsome earthquake zones could be linked. A controversial study argues that at least eight times in the past 3,000 years, quakes made a one–two punch off the west coast of the United States. A quake hit the Cascadia fault off the coast of northern California, triggering a second quake on the San Andreas fault just to the south. In some cases, the delay between the quakes may have been decades long. The study suggests...

The physics-heavy analyses of two databases....detected a point in time where a newly initiated earthquake transitions into a slip pulse where mechanical properties point to magnitude. Melgar and Hayes also were able to identify similar trends in European and Chinese databases. Their study was detailed in the May 29 issue of the online journal Science Advances. Overall, the databases contain data from more than 3,000 earthquakes. Consistent indicators of displacement acceleration that surface between 10-20 seconds into events were seen for 12 major earthquakes occurring in 2003-2016. GPS monitors exist along many land-based faults, including at ground locations near the...

Findings by a team led by an Oregon State University geotechnical engineer are paving the way toward engineering techniques that could keep Pacific Northwest residents safer during the eventual Cascadia Subduction Zone earthquake. By Steve Lundeberg, Oregon State University Ben Mason of the OSU College of Engineering led a National Science Foundation-supported team that traveled to Indonesia to study the aftermath of the magnitude 7.5 Palu-Donggala quake that occurred in September 2018. >>> Roughly 85 miles off the Pacific shoreline, the Cascadia Subduction Zone is a 600-mile fault running from northern California to British Columbia. Over the last 10,000 years,...

USGS reported 11 earthqaukes (the largest a magnitude 5.6) off the Oregon coastline today, right at the Oregon-CA border on the Juan de Fuca rise associated with the subduction zone of the Pacific plates and North American plates. This area, the Juan de Fuca fault subduction zone, has been quiet since 1700 - when a magnitude 9.0 quake occurred dropping land as much as 2 meters (9 feet) over the entire 800 mile Vancouver-Washington-Oregon coastline. That quake in 1700 caused documented 10 meter (30 foot) high tsunami's recorded in Japan that crushed many villages and towns. Many previous large earthquakes...

Just before midnight on Jan. 27, 1700, Japan woke to a massive tsunami, a surprise since no one there felt the earthquake that would’ve caused it. Years later, scientists finally figured out why – it all started in Cascadia, exactly 317 years ago. Samurai, merchants and villagers wrote of minor flooding and damage. Confusion abounded. After all, there had been no tremor in Japan that would’ve given locals warning of a rogue wave.The “orphan tsunami” wouldn’t be linked to the parent earthquake, which originated in the geologically active Pacific Northwest’s Cascadia subduction zone, until the 1990s. The zone hosts a...

Last summer, a startling article appeared in The New Yorker magazine outlining what could happen to the Pacific Northwest in the event of a large earthquake resulting from a full rupture of the Cascadia Subduction Zone. As recently as 1700, this convergent zone produced an earthquake estimated at magnitude 9. The article attracted a great deal of attention, especially among people who had never heard of the possibility that the heavily populated Pacific Northwest could, in a geologic moment, become “toast” — as someone quoted in the article put it. The San Francisco Bay Area also suffers from the unfortunate...

As military helicopters ferry search and rescue teams over the Pacific Northwest, below them are scenes of devastation from a giant earthquake that could strike the region at any time. Tsunami waters surge through coastal communities. Buildings, bridges and roads lie in ruins. Fires burn out of control. Survivors are stranded on rooftops, cling to floating debris or are trapped inside wrecked buildings. Seismologists say a full rupture of a 650-mile-long offshore fault running from Northern California to British Columbia and an ensuing tsunami could come in our lifetime, and emergency management officials are busy preparing for the worst. Federal,...

An ocean data buoy is alerting to an "event" in the Cascadia Subduction Zone off the west coast of Oregon. This is where a magnitude 9 earthquake hit in 1700. According to the data buoy, the water column height (depth) fell sharply within minutes off the coast of Oregon, signaling the land beneath the ocean has suddenly "sunk." As of 0231:30, the initial water column height is 2738.80 Meters deep (8985.56 feet). Two minutes and thirty seconds later, that same water column height had dropped to 2738.66 Meters deep (8985.10 feet). Where did the four inches of water disappear to?...

A tsunami generated by a massive earthquake off Alaska could cause major damage to California's economy and force 750,000 people to evacuate, a report published Wednesday warned. One third of all boats in California's marinas could be damaged or sunk, costing some $700 million in losses, while major ports would struggle to get huge cargo vessels out to sea in time to avoid being buffeted by tsunamis. Experts from the US Geological Survey (USGS) based their damage assessment on the scenario of a 9.1 magnitude quake off Alaska's Pacific Coast, which it said was "hypothetical but plausible." "In this scenario...

A wall of water up to 55 yards high crashing into the Atlantic seaboard of the United States, flattening everything in its path -- not a Hollywood movie but a dire prophecy by some British and U.S. academics. As the international community struggles to aid victims of last month's devastating tsunami in southern Asia, scientists warn an eruption of a volcano in Spain's Canary Islands could unleash a "mega-tsunami" larger than any in recorded history. Hammocks almost buried at the beach of Pajara district in Fuerteventura island (Canary Island), southern Spain. Countries all around the Atlantic rim could be hit...

Researchers plot course of ancient American tsunami Researchers have calculated the scale of a giant wave that devastated the north west coast of America 1,100 years ago. Japanese scientists used computer modelling to recreate the devastation from the ancient tsunami. The team from the Disaster Reduction and Human Renovation Institution in Kobe say the work will help planners minimise the impact of any future wave. The researchers took clues from silt deposits found in the Puget Sound, a Pacific inlet above earthquake fault lines in the Seattle area. Experts say the tsunami could have reached up to seven metres in...

The Cascadia fault, a 600-mile-long collision between two chunks of the earth's crust off the Pacific Northwest coast, has been quiet for a long time, and that is not a comforting fact. Major earthquakes occur somewhere in the world every year or two. Catastrophic tsunamis - giant waves generated by undersea earthquakes or landslides - strike less often, and some of the largest of tsunamis originate in places that do not, at first glance, appear particularly treacherous. The devastating tsunamis created Dec. 26 by a magnitude 9.0 earthquake that killed as many as 150,000 people on the shores of the...

Northwest region is 72 years overdue for next big earthquake, experts sayOne of Oregon’s top earthquake experts predicts the “really big one” will wipe out the entire Northwest. In fact, the area’s FEMA director said everything west of I-5 “will be toast”. Andrew Phelps, director of the Oregon Office of Emergency Management, says there will be 6 minutes of shaking when the 'really big' quake hits. (KOIN) Andrew Phelps, director of the Oregon Office of Emergency Management, says there will be 6 minutes of shaking when the ‘really big’ quake hits. (KOIN) In The New Yorker article “The Really Big...