From the University of Miami Rosenstiel School of Marine & Atmospheric Science , an interesting groundbreaking paper, ahem…but, wait for it, we’ll soon hear “Climate disruption causes more hurricanes and those cause more earthquakes” from the Rommists and McKibbenites.
Research study shows link between earthquakes and tropical cyclones
New study may help scientists identify regions at high risk for earthquakes
SAN FRANCISCO – Dec. 8, 2011 – A groundbreaking study led by University of Miami (UM) scientist Shimon Wdowinski shows that earthquakes, including the recent 2010 temblors in Haiti and Taiwan, may be triggered by tropical cyclones (hurricanes and typhoons). Wdowinski will discuss his findings during a presentation at the 2011 AGU Fall Meeting in San Francisco.
“Very wet rain events are the trigger,” said Wdowinski, associate research professor of marine geology and geophysics at the UM Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science. “The heavy rain induces thousands of landslides and severe erosion, which removes ground material from the Earth’s surface, releasing the stress load and encouraging movement along faults.”
Wdowinski and a colleague from Florida International University analyzed data from quakes magnitude-6 and above in Taiwan and Haiti and found a strong temporal relationship between the two natural hazards, where large earthquakes occurred within four years after a very wet tropical cyclone season.
During the last 50 years three very wet tropical cyclone events – Typhoons Morakot, Herb and Flossie – were followed within four years by major earthquakes in Taiwan’s mountainous regions. The 2009 Morakot typhoon was followed by a M-6.2 in 2009 and M-6.4 in 2010. The 1996 Typhoon Herb was followed by M-6.2 in 1998 and M-7.6 in 1999 and the 1969 Typhoon Flossie was followed by a M-6.2 in 1972.
The 2010 M-7 earthquake in Haiti occurred in the mountainous region one-and-a-half years after two hurricanes and two tropical storms drenched the island nation within 25 days.
The researchers suggest that rain-induced landslides and excess rain carries eroded material downstream. As a result the surface load above the fault is lessened.
“The reduced load unclamp the faults, which can promote an earthquake,” said Wdowinski.
Fractures in Earth’s bedrock from the movement of tectonic plates, known as faults, build up stress as they attempt to slide past each other, periodically releasing the stress in the form of an earthquake.
According to the scientists, this earthquake-triggering mechanism is only viable on inclined faults, where the rupture by these faults has a significant vertical movement.
Wdowinski also shows a trend in the tropical cyclone-earthquake pattern exists in M-5 and above earthquakes. The researchers plan to analyze patterns in other seismically active mountainous regions – such as the Philippines and Japan – that are subjected to tropical cyclones activity.
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How can a landslide relieve weight from the ground? It’s just earth that was at one altitude now located at a somewhat lower altitude.
Miami scientists one step closer to proving global warming caused Japanese earthquake and tsunami. Al Gore said to feel “vindicated”…
/sarc
This guy was on the board of the company where I worked until I retired. He seems to know some things about earthquakes. I would listen, with interest. On the other hand, he could be completely wrong and earthquakes could be the movements of turtles that hold up the land. 😉
Guess they haven’t considered how many earthquakes they’ll cause with this… and what the hell is this anyways? Man made climate change? Or total BS?
“BEIJING – China will begin four regional programs to artificially increase precipitation across the country before 2015, according to the newly released 12th Five-Year Plan (2011-2015) for meteorological development.
Together with the existing program in Jilin province, to influence weather in northeastern parts of China, the five regional weather control programs will increase artificial precipitation volume by 10 percent, according to the plan.
Each year, an average of 3 trillion cubic meters of water passes over China in clouds, and only 20 percent of it falls to the ground, according to the China Meteorological Administration (CMA).
Currently, 50 billion cubic meters of rain and snow are gained annually in artificial precipitation, but the volume could reach 280 billion cubic meters if more effective weather intervention measures are taken, according to the CMA.
“Because clouds are boundless, weather control is boundless. The five regional weather control programs will coordinate the ground resources, such as the cloud seeding rockets and planes, across provinces to increase potential rain or snow,” said Zheng Jiangping, deputy director of the CMA’s department of emergency response, disaster mitigation and public services emergency management…
As extreme weather events such as drought and flooding become more common, protecting the nation’s main wheat producing areas grows in urgency – thus the first regional program chose the northeastern parts of the country, including Liaoning, Jilin, Heilongjiang provinces in Northeast China and the eastern part of the Inner Mongolia autonomous region in North China.
“The program in Jilin was finished late this year and is working well. The successful operation will accelerate the construction of the other four,” Zheng said…
A national weather intervention command center will also be established before 2015, according to the plan… [it will] focus on scientific research and development of weather control techniques, providing technological support to the regional weather stations and coordinating the country’s cross-region weather intervention.”
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2011-12/09/content_14235803.htm
How many tropical storms have hit Haiti over the centuries WITHOUT causing a quake. Why didn’t they cause a quake then? Why did this one cause a quake … four years later?
I am not accusing them of lying but it certainly appears as if they are attempting to manufacture facts. Lies are easy to counter. Made up facts are more difficult.
When applied to shallow fault zones under the sea floor, or to deep fault zones several kilometers below the water table (total about 90% of all known earthquake fault zones), this argument simply does not hold water.
Someone already mentioned Christchurch in New Zealand. I would also add a few others including Fukushima Japan, Newcastle Australia, and the one in Indonesia. Of these particular deadly quakes, two regions are in the tropical cyclone zone – Fukushima and Indonesia. On the other hand Newcastle is not, and neither is Christchurch.
New Zealand is on the ring of fire. There have been several deadly earthquakes. In Christchurch it was the shallow quake with an epicentre in the harbour of Lyttleton that was extremely deadly. Other deadly quakes in New Zealand have been on the north island, at Wellington and Hawkes Bay where land actually appeared after the quake!!
Then there are those series of tremors and quakes that are felt in Melbourne from time to time. Having experienced one of those tremors, and vividly remembering what happened after all these years, I cannot say with certainty that there was any rain event prior but I can say with certainty that there were no cyclones!!!!!! Melbourne, or at least the Mornington Peninsula is on a fault line which explains why there are so many of these tremors. The earthquake in Newcastle had some similarity to that of Christchurch because it was shallow and involved sand.
@Allan M
Maybe you could separate dihydrogeniummonoxid from oxygeniumdihydrid to get rid of the wettness and the weight?
I can hear the geophysicists laughing from here.
Water could also be argued to lubricate smaller earthquake zones to release strain so that a larger one won’t occur, so they wont go anywhere with this kind of earthquake socialism. But the effect of rain/other water is so small overall as to be negligible.
There is no relationship with rainfall and earthquake risk, just as there isnt any relationship with people who read the bible and the earthquake of Portugal 1755, Voltaire knew this. Perhaps 18th century atheists are like todays skeptics.
Sad to see, again, the worst part of climatology — storytelling. Is this a plausible chain of events perhaps yes. But is there any physical data (as someone above suggested, calculating the weight of dirt removal etc.).
Just because climatologists can come up with a plausible mechanism, it does not make it so.
Another example — almost no warming in the past 10 years must be the Chinese with their aerosols. FAIL
First step on the road to blaming AGW for earthquakes, is anyone really that mad ?
Well who knows, but given every man and his dog has jumped on the AGW bandwagon to further their cause or to obtain funding for research , you can’t rule it out.
Butterfly involvement is just as likely:-)
This sounds impressive until you look at a list of earthquakes occurring in Taiwan. You will notice the rarity of gaps larger than 4 years between consecutive magnitude M6.0 or greater earthquakes in the last 50 years.
Assuming that the Wiki list is accurate, if one were to select a random point in time from that 50 year period and ask what is the probability that an earthquake of that order of magnitude will occur within the next 4 year period, the answer is about 92%. If you independently choose any three points in time (e.g. after the particular monsoons), the probability that each of them will subsequently be followed by earthquakes with a four year time period is about 77.9%.
This hardly constitutes a “strong temporal relationship” underany definition of those words. I hope that they better evidence than that to link those “two natural hazards”.
I remember years ago (1980’s) hearing about a correlation between heavy winter storms and earthquakes in southern Alaska. It’s not a new idea. The way I’d look at it, an increase in pore water pressure due to extreme rain could trigger an earthquake if the rocks were very close to failure anyway. The water wouldn’t actually cause the earthquake, which was going to happen sooner or later anyway, but it might trigger it today instead of next month or next year.
I guess that’s why Kaua’i is shaking itself apart with earthquakes .. all that massive rain
Typical hippie-reasoning: treating possibility completely separately from the attached probability.
‘Science’ is no longer about understanding: it has become a surrogate for reading entrails.
Heheh. It is incredible what “scientific” conclusions can be extracted from absurdities…
“The reduced load unclamp the faults, which can promote an earthquake,”
I suppose there aren’t earthquakes in deep sea then. All that “wet water” is a big big weight.
And on cities too, all that cars, people – heavier due to unhealthy food- , buildings!
it is a big weight that can prevent the unclamping.
So if the Chinese jump all at same time what happens a clamping or an unclamping?
No matter if this is media spin or it is actually in the paper, it’s a great Balderdash card.
From the summary it looks like they accept a very loose definition of temporal proximity. To link effect to an event 4 years previous? Not sure I’m buying it.
There has to be some fixes for this in the works that mirror mirrors in outerspace. Like super large staple guns mounted on a super duper earth removers. Bet there is a shovel ready grant just Waitin, Wishin, Wantin to be granted by Obama.
You can’t fix stupid. You have to vote it out.
Should be alright in my location – the rain being, I think, only ordinarily wet. However, about a thousand billion tons of salt water invade my local Indian Ocean bay twice every day and that stuff is very wet indeed. Should I stay home tonight?
Four years? Seriously? Wow have they ever discovered a smoking gun. Or maybe just some way to get their share of the AGW gravy train.
If climate change is causing heavy rains which cause earthquakes, then climate change is helping prevent damage from earthquakes by relieving the pressure early before it builds up into a major quake.
What would you rather have, a lot of very small quakes or one big one? The energy is the same – the only difference is the time period over which it is spread.
So, in this case CO2 and AGW is a benefit – as we are seeing from the numbers on cyclones.
JuergenK says:@Allan M
Maybe you could separate dihydrogeniummonoxid from oxygeniumdihydrid to get rid of the wettness and the weight?
Or possibly a temporal separation. That would be very useful for something like our space program, lightening the weight of cargo we send up from Cape Canaveral in the space shuttle. It could be re-hydrated later, once the shuttle is up in orbit.
Also, the shuttle is fueled by liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen. When they combine in the rocket engines, they make water, or at that temperature, steam. Hard to imagine the space shuttle as a steam engine, but I digress. Perhaps they could capture that steam and recycle it once they get in space.
“ferd berple says:
December 9, 2011 at 7:39 am
If climate change is causing heavy rains which cause earthquakes, then climate change is helping prevent damage from earthquakes by relieving the pressure early before it builds up into a major quake.
What would you rather have, a lot of very small quakes or one big one? The energy is the same – the only difference is the time period over which it is spread.
So, in this case CO2 and AGW is a benefit – as we are seeing from the numbers on cyclones.”
____________________________
You beat me to it!
Could not have said it any better myself!