SUMATRA QUAKE REVISED TO 9.0 MAG

usgs ^

[Brian Mosely]

Magnitude 9.0 - OFF THE WEST COAST OF NORTHERN SUMATRA
2004 December 26 00:58:50 UTC

Preliminary Earthquake Report
U.S. Geological Survey, National Earthquake Information Center
World Data Center for Seismology, Denver

A great earthquake occurred at 00:58:50 (UTC) on Sunday, December 26, 2004. The magnitude 9.0 event has been located OFF THE WEST COAST OF NORTHERN SUMATRA. (This event has been reviewed by a seismologist.)

Magnitude		9.0
Date-Time	Sunday, December 26, 2004 at 00:58:50 (UTC) = Coordinated Universal Time Sunday, December 26, 2004 at 6:58:50 AM = local time at epicenter
Location	3.298°N, 95.779°E
Depth	10 km (6.2 miles) set by location program
Region		OFF THE WEST COAST OF NORTHERN SUMATRA
Distances	250 km (155 miles) SSE of Banda Aceh, Sumatra, Indonesia 320 km (200 miles) W of Medan, Sumatra, Indonesia 1260 km (780 miles) SSW of BANGKOK, Thailand 1605 km (1000 miles) NW of JAKARTA, Java, Indonesia
	Location Uncertainty	horizontal +/- 9.2 km (5.7 miles); depth fixed by location program
Parameters	Nst=157, Nph=157, Dmin=>999 km, Rmss=1.35 sec, Gp= 29°, M-type=moment magnitude (Mw), Version=9
Source	USGS NEIC (WDCS-D)
	Event ID	usslav
Felt Reports	At least 3,000 people killed in Sri Lanka, 2,300 in India, 2,000 in Indonesia, 289 in Thailand, 42 in Malaysia, 8 in Somalia and 2 in Bangladesh by tsunamis. Tsunamis also occurred on the coasts of Maldives and Cocos Island. At least 200 people killed, buildings destroyed or damaged in the Banda Aceh area, Sumatra. Felt widely in Sumatra. Also felt in Bangladesh, India, Malaysia, Myanmar, Singapore and Thailand. This is now the fourth largest earthquake in the world since 1900 and is the largest since the 1964 Prince William Sound, Alaska earthquake.

Today's shallow, thrust-type earthquake occurred off the west coast of northern Sumatra at the interface between the India and Burma plates. In this region, the Burma plate is characterized by significant strain partitioning due to oblique convergence of the India and Australia plates to the west and the Sunda and Eurasian plates to the east. Off the west coast of northern Sumatra, the India plate is moving in a northeastward direction at about 5 cm per year relative to the Burma plate. Preliminary locations of larger aftershocks following today's earthquake show that approximately 1000 km of the plate boundary slipped as a result of the earthquake. Aftershocks are distributed along much of the shallow plate boundary between northern Sumatra (approximately 3 degrees north) to near Andaman Island (at about 14 degrees north).

[calex59]

yep

[calex59]

I assume our sub-seeking/wave radared satellites would give plenty of warning. Why not?

A sunami can travel up to 300 miles per hour. If you are on land and see the water suck out to sea suddenly you will have about 10 minutes to get the heck out of Dodge. There are warning systems that can be installed but still you are not going to have a lot of time when a quake hits close to land.

[xzins]

Diego....good catch DrE.

Prayers aloft

[Quix]

Of course. I realized that. Was thinking about such as Seychelles; Diego Garcia Sri Lanka etc.

[Quix]

THANKS.

Much appreciated.

[topher]

I am certain that Washington would let them know about the earthquake and Tsunnami -- our government tried to issue warnings but other governments did not have provisions for it.

Anything to evacuate the base would have to be down with approval on the command chain, and certainly they would have some sort of communication way before they needed to start evacuating.

But there can always be a SNAFU.

[topher]

i did that this morning nothing yet

Diego Garcia is okay -- must have been too deep of water around the islands. From the pics, it looks like the water gets very deep very fast.

This Tsunami had 2 meter swell, but for like 100,000 feet.

What causes a wall of water is stopping from 300 mph to 30 mph in swallow water, and the 2 meter swell piling up into a 80+ feet wave -- basically 2 meters of wave 100,000 feet long piling into a small area [compression] because of stopping [going from 300 mph to 30 mph].

Apparently, Diago Garcia must have had deep water, so it stayed at 2 meters an did not grow into a bigger wave.

[topher]

Almost 100 times stronger than the Northridge quake 10 years ago.

someone pointed out the energy is 32 times with each point -- so it would 1024 times the energy and 100 times the ground motion.

[bvw]

LOL. Oh boy, does age betray! At one time I would have seen that usage immediately.

[margieelisabeth]

Diego Garcia is fine, my son is stationed there and we recieved email from him yesterday, they didnt even feel the quake, and his Weather Officer sent out email this morning saying this:

Diego Garcia is at the top of the Chagos Trench located just to our east (hence the island chain name of Chagos Archipelago). This trench is very deep and the steepness of the grade from the trench to the top of the island does not allow tsunamis to build up before they were to come on shore.
They all had a great Christmas (as good as you can away from home that is) and are busy working as usual.

[snopercod]

Yes. Also, for some reason the full moon gives me the urge to run around naked in the woods and howl.

[DollyCali]

got to sleep early (needed it) and catching up on threads. This is a very helpful description for those of us lacking the technical knowledge. Thank you.

[Quix]

Actually, I *DID* interpret that disaster as a message from God to our Judeao Christian culture. A bit of a wake-up call that we were not as high and mighty and that America had better be very careful--our beloved President had better be very careful about how he treats Israel.

And just this morning I read how he's all set to demand that Israel give up virtually all of the West Bank.

Sobering, to me.

[Libertarian4Bush]

Actually, I *DID* interpret that disaster as a message from God to our Judeao Christian culture.

well, in that case - and I mean this as gently as possible - I'm not sure we're even able to frame this discussion in any kind of constructive manner.

my original comments were in response to someone who insulted another FReeper who was discouraged by the religious overtones of other threads, specifically to express my disgust at anyone who thought this quake was a message to Muslims.

while further analogies have been discussed, my point is that such assertions are inappropriate, disrespectful, and absurd. and believe me, I don't go out of my way to be "tolerant". in this case, people are people, and an awful lot of truly innocent people died. I find it hard to interpret the death of seven year old girls, who have done nothing in their life to hurt anyone, as some kind of message from god.

again, not (necessarily) responding to all of YOUR views here, just the ones I, and others, left other threads to get away from. my comments apply to anyone who would encourage such talk. ymmv.

[Quix]

Thanks for your reasoned post.

I won't reply at length here.

I do believe post #1311

at:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/religion/1274030/posts?page=1307

SPEAKS VERY WELL to the issue your being boggled about as you stated with:

"in this case, people are people, and an awful lot of truly innocent people died. I find it hard to interpret the death of seven year old girls, who have done nothing in their life to hurt anyone, as some kind of message from god."

[Godzilla]

"Okay, so now what®?"

I wouldn't plan on vacationing in the region for at least a year.

"Mt St Helens, while not associated with these quakes, appears ready to go"

She may have an explosive eruption, but it would not be anywhere near that which blew most of the top off.

Godzilla, A penny for your thoughts...is real estate around Seattle about to take a dive?

I would only get concerned IF Rainer becomes active. there is a great deal of information concerining potential risks from mudflows/lahars to the Seattle/Tacoma area and if you live there, you should review them.