About 30 earthquakes strike in Southern California 'sequence'

A cluster of earthquakes that began Tuesday night continued Wednesday in northern OrangeCounty, keeping residents on edge but causing little significant damage.

Photos emerged of bottles falling off a supermarket shelf in Anaheim Hills, but fire officials said they didn't get reports of anything more serious.

At a news conference Wednesday morning, Kate Hutton of the U.S. Geological Survey at Caltech said there had been at least 30 quakes since last night, but only three could be felt by residents.

"This is all part of the same earthquake sequence; they're all in the same area,'' Hutton told reporters at the briefing, which was televised by several TV stations.

Experts said more aftershocks are likely. LA Times

 

Hutton said there were two 4.5-magnitude earthquakes, one on Tuesday night and another on Wednesday morning, and then there was also a 3.4-magnitude earthquake.

"This is all part of the same earthquake sequence. They're all in the same area," Hutton said. abclocal.go.com

Hutton said there are a few ways to look at the event. One is that there was a double earthquake, with two main shocks. The other way is to consider this an earthquake swarm, where there are a series of earthquakes that are about the same size or smaller. abclocal.go.com

According to the U.S. Geological Survey, Wednesday's 4.5-magnitude quake hit one mile north-northwest of Yorba Linda and four miles east-northeast of Placentia at 9:33 a.m. PT. Along with much of OrangeCounty, residents in Whittier, West Covina, Long Beach, North Hollywood and San Bernardino reported feeling the quake. abclocal.go.com

Seismologists say the worst is still yet to come. According to a recent study, the West Coast will experience a catastrophic quake during the next 50 years. RT

Although Tuesday night's 4.4-magnitude earthquake near Yorba Linda, CA and a series of aftershocks afterward was not immediately blamed for any injuries or extensive damage, there could be a natural disaster of epic proportions during the next few decades. A study released out of Oregon State University last week did not warn researchers about this week's quake, but it did lead them to suggest that a tragedy on par with last year's Fukushima, Japan disaster could be only a few years away. RT

Scientists with the school estimate that there's a 50 percent chance that a major earthquake will strike southern Oregon near its border with California during the next half-century. The Pacific Northwest region of North America has suffered fewer than two dozen major earthquakes during the last 10,000 years, but the University's researchers say it's about time that a new eruption rips through the Cascadia fault. RT

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