Earthquake Triggers False Alarms In The US
Posted on: Monday, 24 November 2008, 16:11 CST
Scientists reported that a powerful earthquake off Russia's eastern coast on Monday caused automated monitoring systems to falsely indicate small temblors in Idaho and California.
The U.S. Geological Survey said the real quake had a preliminary magnitude of 7.3 and struck the Sea of Okhotsk 195 miles west of Petropavlovsk-Kamchatskiy, on Russia's Kamchatka Peninsula.
In the western U.S., the jolt caused computerized seismic stations to send out false quake reports. The report said there was a magnitude of 4.8 earthquake in southeastern Idaho and a 3.8 magnitude quake in central California.
The initial automated reports were accompanied by a standard caution saying they had yet to be reviewed by seismologists.
Geophysicists Julie Martinez, of the USGS National Earthquake Information Center in Golden, Colorado, said the false reports were deleted after seismologists reviewed the computer records.
According to the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center in Hawaii, no Pacific-wide tsunami was expected.
Kate Hutton, a seismologist at the California Institute of Technology said a distant earthquake that is both large and deep can sometimes confuse faraway seismic stations. A scientist is always on call to verify a computer generated report.
"We know it's a problem," Hutton said.
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Image Caption: Kamchatka is home to many volcanoes, including Avachinsky shown here. Courtesy Jan van der Crabben - Wikipedia
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Source: redOrbit Staff & Wire Reports
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