Earthquakes in Divers Places (Matthew 24:7-8; Luke 21:11) - Signs of the Times
Second Earthquake in Less Than a Month Rattles Iran, Near Nuke Reactor
May 6, 2013AP - Iran says a moderate earthquake rattled a region near the country's main nuclear reactor, but there were no reports of damage or deaths in the surrounding area.
The official Islamic Republic News Agency says Monday's quake had a preliminary magnitude of 5.1 and was centered near Kaki, about 100 kilometers (60 miles) southeast of Bushehr on the Persian Gulf coast. A more powerful 6.1 temblor struck the same area last month, killing at least 37 people and raising calls for greater international safety inspectors at the nuclear reactor in Bushehr.
Iran said there was no damage to
the reactor in last month's quake. The IRNA report Monday did not
specifically address the reactor, but said there were no fatalities or
damage in the latest quake.
USA Today - China mobilized thousands of soldiers and rescuers Sunday, a day after a powerful quake struck Sichuan province killing at least 188 people and injuring more than 11,000. Among the deadliest quake the country has seen in the past three years, more than 2,000 aftershocks have rattled the area, The China Earthquake Administration said.
Mountain roads blocked by rocks and landslides hampered rescue efforts to reach every village and household affected by the quake — measured at magnitude-6.6 by the U.S. Geological Survey — that struck Saturday morning in the same region where a 2008 quake took nearly 90,000 lives. The quake's shallow depth, less than 8 miles, likely magnified the impact
Some 18,000 soldiers and armed police were sent to the disaster zone in sourthwestern China, and 10,000 had already reached seriously affected areas, the Chengdu Military Area Command said Sunday, according to state news agency Xinhua.
The Chengdu Military Area Command also said it would send 23 helicopters. As of 4:30 p.m. local time Sunday, the Chinese air force had sent 106 planes for rescue missions, including personnel and material transportation, Xinhua said.
An emergency rescue team with 200 workers organized by the China Earthquake Administration (CEA), joined their provincial counterparts in the quake zone Sunday afternoon, but bad weather delayed plans to reach hard-hit Baoxing County, which has had little contact with the outside world, according to the CEA.
Chinese Premier Li Keqiang visited injured survivors Sunday before returning to Beijing, where Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang said China does not currently need foreign rescue teams or medical and relief supplies. Qin said the country has guaranteed rescue and medical treatment capability and sufficient rescue materials.
Luo Shiqiang sat near chunks of concrete, bricks and a ripped orange sofa and told the Associated Press how his grandfather was just returning from feeding chickens when their house collapsed and crushed him to death in the earthquake.
Two soldiers assisting in the rescue efforts died after their vehicle slid off a road and rolled down a cliff, state media reported.
The Chinese Red Cross said it had deployed relief teams with supplies of food, water, medicine and rescue equipment to the disaster areas.
However, many residents complained that although emergency teams were quick to carry away bodies and search for survivors, they had so far done little to distribute aid.
On Saturday, state media showed images of collapsed buildings, roads blocked by fallen rocks and hundreds of people seeking medical attention at a makeshift triage center outside the county hospital in Lushan, located at the edge of the Tibetan plateau.
Premier Li flew by helicopter to the quake zone in Lushan on Saturday afternoon, where he met survivors and local government and army leaders.
Authorities' quick response will likely win popular support in China, where many citizens consider government officials corrupt and self-serving. However, the quake may also serve as a test of transparency for the new regime especially if evidence is uncovered that shoddy construction contributed to deaths and injuries.
After the 2008 quake, authorities went to great lengths to bury bad news about the high number of schools that collapsed, killing thousands of children. It also jailed people who gathered information on the issue or tried to expose the corrupt practices that had led to the poorly built schools.
In the immediate aftermath of Saturday's quake, Chinese Internet users focused on trying to help. Bloggers in the quake zone turned Saturday to Sina Weibo, a Twitter-like service, to call for assistance.
Organizations and individuals quickly responded with volunteer action, including Li Chengpeng, a Sichuan-based writer and former soccer commentator, whose profile as a social critic rose after the 2008 disaster when he joined rescue efforts and saw the schools firsthand. On his Sina Weibo account, which has millions of followers, Li posted Saturday that he had organized an expert rescue team to send to Ya'an, and welcomed donations of money or manpower.
Other volunteer efforts also spread via Weibo. Inspirational stories emerged, including one about local Ya'an television anchorwoman Chen Ying, who rushed to file reports while dressed in her wedding gown on her wedding day. And Chinese Central Television reported that the giant pandas were safe in the country's biggest panda research center in Ya'an, located about 26 miles from the epicenter.
China rushes relief after Sichuan quake kills 188
April 22, 2013USA Today - China mobilized thousands of soldiers and rescuers Sunday, a day after a powerful quake struck Sichuan province killing at least 188 people and injuring more than 11,000. Among the deadliest quake the country has seen in the past three years, more than 2,000 aftershocks have rattled the area, The China Earthquake Administration said.
Mountain roads blocked by rocks and landslides hampered rescue efforts to reach every village and household affected by the quake — measured at magnitude-6.6 by the U.S. Geological Survey — that struck Saturday morning in the same region where a 2008 quake took nearly 90,000 lives. The quake's shallow depth, less than 8 miles, likely magnified the impact
Some 18,000 soldiers and armed police were sent to the disaster zone in sourthwestern China, and 10,000 had already reached seriously affected areas, the Chengdu Military Area Command said Sunday, according to state news agency Xinhua.
The Chengdu Military Area Command also said it would send 23 helicopters. As of 4:30 p.m. local time Sunday, the Chinese air force had sent 106 planes for rescue missions, including personnel and material transportation, Xinhua said.
An emergency rescue team with 200 workers organized by the China Earthquake Administration (CEA), joined their provincial counterparts in the quake zone Sunday afternoon, but bad weather delayed plans to reach hard-hit Baoxing County, which has had little contact with the outside world, according to the CEA.
Chinese Premier Li Keqiang visited injured survivors Sunday before returning to Beijing, where Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang said China does not currently need foreign rescue teams or medical and relief supplies. Qin said the country has guaranteed rescue and medical treatment capability and sufficient rescue materials.
Luo Shiqiang sat near chunks of concrete, bricks and a ripped orange sofa and told the Associated Press how his grandfather was just returning from feeding chickens when their house collapsed and crushed him to death in the earthquake.
"We lost everything in such a short time," the 20-year-old college student said Sunday.He said his cousin also was injured in the collapse, but that other members of his family were spared because they were out working in the fields of hard-hit Longmen village in Lushan County.
Two soldiers assisting in the rescue efforts died after their vehicle slid off a road and rolled down a cliff, state media reported.
The Chinese Red Cross said it had deployed relief teams with supplies of food, water, medicine and rescue equipment to the disaster areas.
However, many residents complained that although emergency teams were quick to carry away bodies and search for survivors, they had so far done little to distribute aid.
"No water, no shelter," read a hand-written sign held up by children on a roadside in Longmen, according to the AP.Chinese journalist delays her wedding following a magnitude-6.6 earthquake to cover the story in her wedding dress.
On Saturday, state media showed images of collapsed buildings, roads blocked by fallen rocks and hundreds of people seeking medical attention at a makeshift triage center outside the county hospital in Lushan, located at the edge of the Tibetan plateau.
Premier Li flew by helicopter to the quake zone in Lushan on Saturday afternoon, where he met survivors and local government and army leaders.
Authorities' quick response will likely win popular support in China, where many citizens consider government officials corrupt and self-serving. However, the quake may also serve as a test of transparency for the new regime especially if evidence is uncovered that shoddy construction contributed to deaths and injuries.
After the 2008 quake, authorities went to great lengths to bury bad news about the high number of schools that collapsed, killing thousands of children. It also jailed people who gathered information on the issue or tried to expose the corrupt practices that had led to the poorly built schools.
In the immediate aftermath of Saturday's quake, Chinese Internet users focused on trying to help. Bloggers in the quake zone turned Saturday to Sina Weibo, a Twitter-like service, to call for assistance.
Organizations and individuals quickly responded with volunteer action, including Li Chengpeng, a Sichuan-based writer and former soccer commentator, whose profile as a social critic rose after the 2008 disaster when he joined rescue efforts and saw the schools firsthand. On his Sina Weibo account, which has millions of followers, Li posted Saturday that he had organized an expert rescue team to send to Ya'an, and welcomed donations of money or manpower.
Other volunteer efforts also spread via Weibo. Inspirational stories emerged, including one about local Ya'an television anchorwoman Chen Ying, who rushed to file reports while dressed in her wedding gown on her wedding day. And Chinese Central Television reported that the giant pandas were safe in the country's biggest panda research center in Ya'an, located about 26 miles from the epicenter.
Major quake strikes Iran-Pakistan border
April 16, 2013AP - A major earthquake struck Tuesday near the Iran-Pakistan border and shook buildings as far away as New Delhi and Gulf cities of Dubai and Bahrain. There were no immediate reports of injuries or serious damage.
The quake struck less than a week after a 6.1 magnitude quake hit near Bushehr, on Iran's Persian Gulf coast, killing at least 37 people and raising calls for greater international safety inspections at the country's long energy-producing nuclear reactor.
Iran's seismological center said the 7.5 magnitude earthquake was centered near Saravan, a sparsely populated area about 48 kilometers (26 miles) from the Pakistani border. The U.S. Geological Survey put the preliminary magnitude at 7.8 and at a depth of 15.2 kilometers (nine miles).
The quake was felt over a vast area from New Delhi to Gulf cities that have some of the world's tallest skyscrapers, including the record 828-meter (2,717 -foot) Burj Khalifa in Dubai. Officials ordered temporary evacuations from some high-rises as a precaution.
Pakistani news channels showed buildings shaking in the southern city of Karachi, where people in panic came out from offices and homes. There was no immediate word on any damage and people were seen standing outside their homes and offices even minutes after the quack rattled various parts of the country.
In 2003, some 26,000 people were killed by a 6.6 magnitude quake that flattened the historic southeastern Iranian city of Bam.
Iran's Massive Earthquake Explained
April 16, 2013LiveScience.com – The strongest earthquake to hit Iran in more than 50 years was a subduction-zone quake — the same tectonic setting underlying deadly temblors in Japan, Chile and Indonesia.
The magnitude-7.8 Khash earthquake struck 51 miles (82 kilometers) beneath the Earth's surface, where the Arabian Plate dives under the massive Eurasian Plate, the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) reported. The quake hit today (April 16) at 3:14 p.m. local time (6:44 a.m. EDT). Shaking was felt from New Delhi to Dubai, and dozens of people have been reported killed by collapsed structures, according to news reports. The USGS said that there will be more than a 47 percent chance of more than 1,000 fatalities.
Known as the Makran subduction zone, the plate boundary has produced some of the Middle East's biggest and deadliest earthquakes. For example, in November 1945, a magnitude-8.0 earthquake in Pakistan triggered a tsunami within the Gulf of Oman and the Arabian Sea, killing more than 4,000 people.
Considering subduction-zone earthquakes can strike nearly 435 miles (700 km) deep in the Earth, today's quake was likely within the Arabian Plate itself, not along the zone where the two massive slabs meet, said Bill Barnhart, a research geophysicist with the USGS in Denver.
"We don't fully know yet, but instead of being slip along the slab, it was probably an earthquake within the slab," Barnhart told OurAmazingPlanet. "This is related to the subducting slab flexing as it goes down deeper into the Earth."Off the coast of Pakistan, at the mouth of the Persian Gulf, the Arabian Plate is sliding northward at about 1.5 inches (37 millimeters) per year. The motion pushes oceanic crust beneath the Eurasian Plate, which covers most of Europe and Asia, according to the USGS.
To the west, in Iran and Iraq, are the Zagros Mountains, a smaller version of the Himalayas, where continental crust carried on the Arabian Plate collides with the Eurasian Plate's continental crust. To the east, in Pakistan and India, is another plate boundary, where the Indian and Eurasian plates meet.
A smaller earthquake hit Iran on April 9. The magnitude-6.3 Bushehr earthquake, which hit in the southern Zagros Mountains, was unrelated to today's temblor, the USGS said. That quake was a thrust-fault earthquake, meaning the ground on one side of the fault moved vertically up and over the other side, shortening the distance between the two sides. The epicenter was 55 miles (89 km) southeast of Bushehr, the city where Iran's only nuclear power station is located.
In 2003, some 26,000 people in Iran were killed by a 6.6-magnitude quake that flattened the historic city of Bam, located about 400 miles (650 km) east of Bushehr on the other side of the Zagros Mountains. The Bam earthquake was a strike-slip, meaning the ground on either side of the faults moved mostly horizontally, as the San Andreas Fault does.
Swarm of earthquakes shakes central Oklahoma Tuesday
The U.S. Geological Survey reported nine earthquakes Tuesday in central Oklahoma. The largest, a 4.3 magnitude quake, struck at 1:56 a.m. near Luther.
The largest of the quakes was reported at 1:56 a.m. near Luther and woke people in the region. The 4.3 magnitude quake was followed by a 4.2 temblor at 5:16 a.m. in the same area. Other smaller earthquakes occurred throughout the day.
Quakes with a magnitude of 3 are among the smallest that are generally felt, while a magnitude 4 quake can do some damage.
Austin Holland, a seismologist with the Oklahoma Geological Survey, said Tuesday's string of quakes was different from other earthquakes that have struck the area in recent years. The largest earthquake in state history was a 5.7 magnitude quake in November 2011 near Prague.
“These certainly are very different earthquakes than what we've seen in the past,” Holland said. “These were very shallow. They are fairly rare. We haven't seen a series like this that has been so shallow with these size earthquakes.”The quakes that hit the state Tuesday were centered four to five kilometers below ground. Most quakes are dozens of kilometers or more below ground.
No casualties in magnitude 5.6 quake in Russia's Kamchatka
Reuters - A magnitude 5.6 earthquake hit Russia's northern Kamchatka peninsula and weaker shocks could be felt in five inhabited areas, the federal Emergencies Ministry said on Wednesday, adding there were no casualties or damage.
The ministry put the quake's epicenter at a depth of 14 km (nine miles) and some 840 km (522 miles) north of Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, the provincial capital of the region, which is one of the most seismically active areas in the world.
Quake measuring 5.0 strikes off southern Greek coast
Reuters - An earthquake of 5.0 magnitude struck in the Mediterranean just off Greece's southern coast on Sunday, the U.S. Geological Survey said, but there were no immediate reports of injuries or damage.
The quake occurred at 7:42 a.m. (0542 GMT), 34 miles southwest of the coastal city of Kalamata in the Peloponnese region, the Survey said.
Strong but deep quake in Colombia
February 9, 2013AP - A powerful but deep earthquake shook a broad swath of Colombia and Ecuador on Saturday, sending frightened people fleeing into the streets, but there were no immediate reports of significant damage or deaths.
The U.S. Geological Survey
said the 9:16 a.m. (14:16 GMT) quake had a magnitude of 7.0.It was
centered about 7 miles (11 kilometers) from the Colombian town of Pasto
and 77 miles (129 kilometers) below the surface.
The quake was felt in the Colombian capital of Bogota, some 340 miles (545 kilometers) to the northeast, and across much of neighboring Ecuador.
Colombia's national disaster chief, Carlos Ivan Marquez, said officials had made a damage survey across the country "and fortunately up to this moment we have no reports of human losses."
In the province of Narino, where the quake hit, secretary of government Jaime Rodriguez said officials had reports of three people hurt when roof tiles fell in the town of El Charco along the Pacific Coast. Officials in Ecuador also reported no significant damage.
Colombian television showed people fleeing into the streets in southwestern cities such as Cali, and small cracks in the walls of some buildings.
The quake was felt in the Colombian capital of Bogota, some 340 miles (545 kilometers) to the northeast, and across much of neighboring Ecuador.
Colombia's national disaster chief, Carlos Ivan Marquez, said officials had made a damage survey across the country "and fortunately up to this moment we have no reports of human losses."
In the province of Narino, where the quake hit, secretary of government Jaime Rodriguez said officials had reports of three people hurt when roof tiles fell in the town of El Charco along the Pacific Coast. Officials in Ecuador also reported no significant damage.
Colombian television showed people fleeing into the streets in southwestern cities such as Cali, and small cracks in the walls of some buildings.
Tsunami warning issued for South Pacific islands after major quake
The warning was issued for the Solomon Islands, Vanuatu, Nauru, Papua New Guinea, Tuvalu, New Caledonia, Kosrae, Fiji, Kiribati, and Wallis and Futuna islands.
A tsunami watch was issued for the rest of the South Pacific nations, including Australia, New Zealand and Indonesia.
The quake struck at a very shallow depth of only five km (three miles) and was located 340 km (211 miles) east of Kira Kira in the Solomons.
"It is not known that a tsunami was generated. This warning is based only on the earthquake evaluation," said the tsunami center.
Earthquakes magnitude 7.0 or greater in the world, 2002-2013 as of May 7, 2013
2002: 112003: 13
2004: 11
2005: 10
2006: 09
2007: 16
2008: 12
2009: 15
2010: 23
2011: 20
2012: 26
2013: 6
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