Forecasting Tsunami Threats Through Layers of Sand and Time

Newswise ^ | 3-19-2008 | Dalhousie University

[blam]

GGG & Catastrophism Ping.

[stayathomemom]

You better put me on your ping list. Thanks.

[onedoug]

A basic understanding of the tectonics of this region would seem to have been enough as well...but it wasn’t.

[Strategerist]

Something that happens every 500-1000 years is routine in terms of the Earth, but unthinkable to the average person.

I’m sure the Apocalpytikook/”God’s Punishment!” Brigade will ignore this story in their desperate attempts to portray every new natural disaster as something unique and special.

[CarrotAndStick]

Complicated tectonics. The Indo-Australian plate (upon which the Indian Subcontinent and Australia rest) meets with Asia along the Himalayas (the tectonic collision which led to its rise) and through the islands of South-East Asia.

The dynamics between the meeting-points were responsible for the famous tsunami.

[Strategerist]

There’s some evidence there’s a tsunami threat along the boundary to the north running all the way to the Burma/Bangladesh coast, paper on that in the last year.

[CarrotAndStick]

Indian Ocean floor cracks up under the strain

• 05 August 1995
• From New Scientist
• Bob Holmes

 

 

Enlarge image

Indian Ocean floor cracks up

ONE of the Earth's tectonic plates has cracked in two, broken by the stress of pushing up the Himalayas and the Tibetan Plateau. American and French geophysicists have produced the first direct evidence showing that the Indo-Australian plate has broken just south of the Equator in the middle of the Indian Ocean (see Map).

The two halves of the Plate are now going their separate ways, says Jeffrey Weissel of the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory of Columbia University, New York. "If you hold India still in your left hand, and you spin Australia anticlockwise, you get the sense of the motion at that plate boundary," he explains.

A decade ago, geophysicists at North western University in Evanston, Illinois, theorised that the Indo-Australian plate - long thought to be a single unit - was actually two plates, with the Australian portion circling anticlockwise around the Indian one at a rate of about one degree every 3 million years. From mathematical models and indirect measurements, they calculated that the pivot lay about a thousand kilometres south of India.

 

Weissel and his colleagues have now confirmed this theory by calculating the amount of compression east of the pivot, where the seafloor has buckled. They predicted that the relative motion of the two plates - and thus the amount of compression - should be small close to the pivot and increase with distance.

To test this prediction, the researchers put James Van Orman, an undergraduate student, to work analysing sonar images of the Indian Ocean floor collected in 1986 and 1991. At each point where the ocean floor has buckled, Van Orman calculated how much longer the region would have been if it lay flat. He then summed these values along each of two 800-kilometre transects, one just east of the supposed pivot, the other 300 kilometres farther east.

Van Orman found 11.2 kilometres of compression for the transect nearer the pivot and 27.4 kilometres for the eastern transect (Earth and Planetary Science Letters, vol 133, p 35). This shows that the two portions of the Indo-Australian plate are moving independently, says Weissel.

One problem, however, is that the sonar images could not detect any vertical buckling of less than 10 metres. "It's a fairly blurry look at the crust," says Weissel. "We think we haven't missed too much, but not everybody agrees."

Weissel believes that the Indo-Australian plate began to break up about 8 million years ago. By then, India's collision with Asia had pushed up the Himalayas and the Tibetan Plateau, and the mass of these highlands had become so great that tectonic forces could not lift them any further. "Something had to give, and those stresses were released farther back in the IndoAustralian plate," says Weissel.

From issue 1989 of New Scientist magazine, 05 August 1995, page 16

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg14719892.300-indian-ocean-floor-cracks-up-under-the-strain.html

 

 

[onedoug]

Ignorant leadership.

[SunkenCiv]

Weissel believes that the Indo-Australian plate began to break up about 8 million years ago.

Thanks CarrotAndStick.

[SunkenCiv]

7.5 Magnitude Earthquake Hits Sumatra, Indonesia: Tsunami Warning Issued
USGS | 20 Feb 2008 | US GS
Posted on 02/20/2008 3:39:26 AM EST by Alter Kaker
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1973202/posts

Indonesia issues tsunami warning after powerful quake
AP | Feb 25, 2008 10:55
Posted on 02/25/2008 4:31:21 AM EST by maquiladora
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1975803/posts

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks Blam.

· join · view topics · view or post blog · bookmark · post new topic ·

[SunkenCiv]

· join list or digest · view topics · view or post blog · bookmark · post a topic ·
	Gods Graves Glyphs	Thanks Blam. This kind of research is the wave of the fu-, uh, forget it. To all -- please ping me to other topics which are appropriate for the GGG list. GGG managers are Blam, StayAt HomeMother, and Ernest_at_the_Beach
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[SunkenCiv]

Do you want to hear a real earthquake story? Here you go.....
Source: NOAA.gov
Published: ?
Posted on 03/01/2001 20:08:41 PST by Trailer Trash
http://www.freerepublic.com/forum/a3a9f1cc964a4.htm

Arctic Ocean Ice Crashes on Alaska Shores (20’high x100’wide ice tsunami)
ap | Jan 27, 2006 | ap
Posted on 01/27/2006 9:22:19 PM EST by RedBloodedAmerican
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1566611/posts

Research Team Discovers Village (Ancient Bering Sea Island)
Gazette Times | 1-30-2007 | OSU News Service
Posted on 01/30/2007 7:04:22 PM EST by blam
http://freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1776395/posts

Both Coasts of Americas Seen Vulnerable to Tsunamis
(We’re ALL Gonna DIE !!! Alert)
Reuters | Tue, Feb 08, 2005 | Maggie Fox
Posted on 02/08/2005 11:26:56 PM EST by presidio9
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1339144/posts

Tsunami that devastated the ancient world could return
AFP on Yahoo | 3/9/08 | AFP
Posted on 03/09/2008 10:17:08 PM EDT by NormsRevenge
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1983072/posts

SHIP-SINKING MONSTER WAVES REVEALED BY ESA SATELLITES
European Space Agency | 21 July 2004
Posted on 07/25/2004 3:36:29 AM EDT by Yosemitest
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1178061/posts

Was Bristol Hit By A Tsunami? (1607)
Science Daily | 4-30-2007 | University Of Chicago
Posted on 04/30/2007 7:14:31 PM EDT by blam
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1826205/posts

[Fred Nerks]

Indonesia - Tsunami ground zero image.

[SunkenCiv]

Wowzo. I probably should have posted links to the topics about those Madagascar formations.

[Fred Nerks]

Please do...I’ve lost the images of the ‘chevrons’.

[CarrotAndStick]

Wow, amazing!

Do you have a link with more information on that photograph?

Sunkenciv, what are the Madagascar formations you’ve mentioned earlier?

[Fred Nerks]

Do you have a link with more information on that photograph?

sorry, no...I saved the image not the article.

[CarrotAndStick]

Oh, never mind. I found that the image you posted is a screenshot from a Discovery channel documentary:

http://www.discoverychannel.co.uk/earth/ground_zero/performer/index.shtml

http://www.discoverychannel.co.uk/earth/ground_zero/introduction/index.shtml