Experts say it’s only a matter of time before the “big one” shakes Oklahoma

ktla ^ | November 23, 2015 | Leslie Rangel

[crusty old prospector]

There is a major buried fault system running from around OKC to Kansas called the Nehama Ridge or Uplift. It is probably the source of the earthquakes.

[crusty old prospector]

Here is a cross section view. It comes within a few thousand feet of the surface.

[crusty old prospector]

They are injecting frac water into the Arbuckle Formation, which you can see on the bottom left side of the cross section.

[crusty old prospector]

http://countywidenews.com/its-because-of-the-wilzetta-fault-p4919-94.htm

It looks like some of the earthquakes are along the Wilzetta Fault. Here is an article about it.

[Cringing Negativism Network]

I see the Nemaha ridge you mentioned, but what is the Wilzetta Fault?

Is it near the Namaha ridge?

And why is there no evidence of this, on the surface?

Thank you.

[crusty old prospector]

They are remnants of a very old mountain range. The mountains were probably as big as the Rockies. They were eroded down to a flat surface. Younger deposits were then laid on top of it. The Wilzetta Fault is a compensating fault to the larger Nemaha Fault, which runs nearly north-south. The Wilzetta runs more northeast-southwest. You can see it on the article.

[Cringing Negativism Network]

Read the article?

When did this start?

Ok I looked. But I don’t see the support for this prediction:

...

In 2011, a 5.6 magnitude earthquake shook the state, becoming the largest quake in recent Oklahoma history.

Now, research shows a bigger, stronger one could hit soon.

...

“It’s unclear exactly how high we might go, and the predictions are upper 5-6 range for most things that I’ve seen,” Todd Halihan, a researcher from OSU, says.

...

It seems to me if the mountains are now very old and they’ve worn down from once being like the Rockies, then they’re not making big quakes there now.

No?

Is this just a hobgoblin to shake up support for the idea that fracking is causing a huge problem?

That is an honest question. I really don’t know, I appreciate your knowledge.

Thanks.

[crusty old prospector]

If you look at the cross section in Post 22, the squiggly line at the top is the current surface of the earth. In the bottom center is a scale but it is in meters. This section has quite a bit of what is called vertical exaggeration which means the vertical scale is amplified to show the detail. You can see that the remnants of the former mountain range are fairly close to the surface. There are a lot of oil accumulations associated with the faults, like the old wells on the state capitol in OKC.

[Cringing Negativism Network]

I am in awe of your knowledge of the subject.

Standing down. Thanks for your feedback.

[crusty old prospector]

There is a lot of debate whether the frac water injection is causing the earthquakes or not. It is not from the actual fracing but from the injection of the waste water. There have been a few recent earthquakes beneath the old Texas Stadium in Irving. Either it is a big coincidence or the injection is changing the stress field of the earth.

[crusty old prospector]

Did you see this link? I can't remember how to make it a hyperlink so you will have to cut and paste it.

http://countywidenews.com/its-because-of-the-wilzetta-fault-p4919-94.htm

[Cringing Negativism Network]

Earthquake activity in this region has been on the rise since 2008, though there is no indication that a more severe earthquake is imminent.

—

Not sure, but I would tend to agree with that statement from the article you just posted.

But then I don’t understand the subject well. Thanks for the education.

[crusty old prospector]

I’m a petroleum geologist. I leave the earthquake seismology to the real nerds like the USGS. But I know something about them. Like the Nemaha / Wilzetta faults have a strike-slip component which is the same as the San Andreas, which comes all the way to the surface. Strike-slip means the two plates are moving past one another as opposed to up and down. But California is at a active plate boundary with the Pacific plate and Oklahoma is not so I wouldn’t think the “big one” is around the corner.

[BatGuano]

That is in my past. They were little stinking monkeys. I no longer use the phrase “it’s only a matter of time.” Brings pain to my nether region.
Back on subject. I would blame it all on Global Warming, if I believed in that crap!

[Sequoyah101]

The horse sale? The threat of buying a hay burner would scare me as well.

[Sequoyah101]

No, no, no, no it has to be all that fricin’ fracing!

I took geology at OSU about 40 years ago and the prof said he was amazed that we had not had a big earthquake yet even though the Nemaha Ridge is OLD and stable.

That was LOOOOOONg before the fracing craze though we have beein fricin’ frackn’ for a long time. It was old stuff when I pumped my first job about 40 years ago but not the volume of of water they use now.

[Sequoyah101]

But where in respect to the ridge? Most injection wells are about 10K or less deep in Logan, Payne so forth aren’t they? Aren’t the quake epicenters much deeper than the water could reach?

Remember the shallow quakes at Rocky Mountain Arsenal caused by water injection?

[Sequoyah101]

The Cyril Fault is the most interesting evidence I have ever seen for abiogenic hydrocarbons. I have drilled across the fault very deep and seen changes in gas units through the fault gouge. The earth above the fault is clearly altered. Gold said is is the evidence of oxides of hydrocarbons.

Most geologists recoil at the thoughts of Gold. I don’t I’ve just drilled in to many settings and found hydrocarbons where there shouldn’t be. White Tiger Field off Vung Tau comes to mind.

[crusty old prospector]

Most faults allow for migration both up and down through them. Some faults act as lateral seals and some leak across the fault so that you need something impermeable across it to form a trap. Even though oil and gas mostly rise towards the surface due to buoyancy, they can migrate down as well.

[crusty old prospector]

The faults are rooted in the Precambrian basement and extend upwards into the Paleozoics, i.e. the Arbuckle where I hear most of the injection is occurring as it still has some porosity retained.