Calculating Tsunami
Risk for the US East Coast
The
greatest threat of a tsunami for the U.S. east coast from a nearby offshore
earthquake stretches from the coast of New England to New Jersey, according to
John Ebel of Boston College, who presented his findings today at the
Seismological Society of America 2013 Annual Meeting.
The
potential for an East Coast tsunami has come under greater scrutiny after a
2012 earthquake swarm that occurred offshore about 280 kilometers (170 miles)
east of Boston. The largest earthquake in the 15-earthquake swarm, most of
which occurred on April 12, 2012, was magnitude (M) 4.0.
The
setting for these earthquakes, at the edge of the continental shelf, is similar
to that of the 1929 M7.3 Grand Banks earthquake, which triggered a 10-meter
tsunami along southern Newfoundland and left tens of thousands of residents
homeless.
Ebel's
preliminary findings suggest the possibility than an earthquake-triggered
tsunami could affect the northeast coast of the U.S. The evidence he cites is
the similarity in tectonic settings of the U.S. offshore earthquakes and the
major Canadian earthquake in 1929. More research is necessary, says Ebel, to
develop a more refined hazard assessment of the probability of a strong
offshore earthquake along the northeastern U.S. coast.
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Seismological Society of America (2013, April 19). Calculating
tsunami risk for the US East Coast. ScienceDaily. Retrieved April
21, 2013, from http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/04/130419160704.htm
