Central California is presently in the middle of an earthquake cloud , with up to 18 ( and counting ) flyspeck quake shaking things up over the course of a exclusive mean solar day . The situation is not , however , as ominous as it may seem .
KTLA reported that the quakesbegan in the Bay Area late last night and have continued through today . With nothing larger than a magnitude of 3.7 , all of the quakes have been comparatively modest . But should the rising tally give consternation ? in all probability not . Central California is just in the eye of a run - of - the - mill quake swarm .
The precise mechanics of what sets an seism swarm off are n’t exonerated , but they ’re passably coarse in geologically active areas . TheUSGS specify them as simplya clump of small earthquakes clustered around the same locale and meter . There ’s no set limits for either the time or sphere . In fact , the seism in a swarm do n’t even call for to stanch from the same geological fault lines .
Is a swarm a sign of something big on its path , though?Probably not . Although the doubtfulness of whether swarm are a predecessor to something big is often take , there ’s no evidence link them now to large seism or eruptions so far . In fact , they ordinarily just pop up in geologically - active areas and then just stop without incident .
Yellowstone National Park , for illustration , is celebrated for being hit by regular quake swarms , include declamatory ones in 2004 , 2009 , and again in 2010.The horde in 2010 lasted for over a monthand admit more than 2,000 earthquake over that menses , several with a magnitude of over 3.0 .
Despite how much bigger and longer that cloud was than California ’s current on - go one , resident physician of the body politic should be comforted to know that Yellowstorm ’s 2010 drove simply petered out on its own , with no larger quake or consequence at the end .
Geology
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