POPULAR holiday islands Tenerife and Gran Canaria were rocked by an earthquake in the early hours of this morning. But could the earthquake trigger an eruption from the volcano in nearby Palma?
The National Geographic Institute said the tremor measured 4.4 on the Richter scale and happened at 6.36am local time, at a depth of five kilometres. Only a minute earlier, a smaller quake, measuring 1.9 on the Richter scale, was also registered in the same place. Two other seismic movements were also recorded, one of them at 2.23am with of magnitude 1.7 and another at 3.07am with a magnitude 1.9.
Could Tenerife earthquake TRIGGER Palma volcano ERUPTION?
The Cumber Vieja volcano is located on the island of La Palma in the Canary Islands.
The volcano is part of an active, albeit currently dormant, volcanic ridge.
It has erupted twice in the last 70 years, first in 1949 and then 1971.
Over the last couple of years, more than a thousand tremors have rumbled from the volcano, which means it could erupt anytime.
Since the start of this year alone, there have been a total of nine earthquakes measuring magnitude 1.5 or higher across the Canary Islands.
The largest of these measured a magnitude 3.5 on January 3 and was located on El Pinar, Canary Islands.
The Cumbre Vieja is approximately 2,600 miles from the British Isles.
Volcanology institute, Involcan says earthquakes of 4.4 magnitude have been previously recorded past between Tenerife and Gran Canaria.
One such occasion was a tremor measuring 5.2 on May 9, 1989.
The organisation posted this morning: "All the stations of the Canary Seismic Network (C7) located in Tenerife, Gran Canaria, La Palma, El Hierro and Lanzarote have registered the magnitude 4.4 earthquake, which occurred between Tenerife and Gran Canaria, at 06:36:51 today."
Involcan also confirmed the tremor "has been widely felt in Tenerife and in some locations of Gran Canaria".
A Magnitude 4.2 earthquake has struck in the Canary Islands and concerns have been raised that if the Cumbre Vieja volcano erupts or otherwise shakes loose, a massive slab of rock could smash into the Atlantic Ocean causing a killer tidal wave along the entire U.S. east coast about 8 hours later.
The earthquake, from the Spanish archipelago’s most active volcano, which is located on the island of La Palma, have sparked panic across the Canary Islands, with volcano experts pulled in to examine the unusual seismic activity.
According to Spain's National Geographic Institute (IGN) at 06:36 (UTC) on January 18, 2019, an earthquake of magnitude 4.2 was recorded between the islands of Tenerife and Gran Canaria, at 14km deep. This earthquake was preceded, one minute in advance, by another earthquake of magnitude 1.8 in the same area.
The main earthquake registered in stations of all the islands of the Archipelago and was widely felt by the population in the islands of Tenerife and Gran Canaria.
According to the information received so far, the earthquake has reached a maximum intensity of III (EMS) in different areas of the northwest island of Gran Canaria and the northeast of Tenerife. Updated information on how this earthquake has been felt can be found here.
The maximum magnitude of earthquakes in this area is 5.2 for an earthquake that occurred on May 9, 1989. It is one of the most active areas of the Canary archipelago.
U.S. EAST COAST IN GRAVE DANGER
A previous warning from Dr. Steven Ward, of the University of California, and Dr. Simon Day, of the Benfield Greig Hazard Research Centre at University College London is now being widely discussed:
They found that if the Cumbre Vieja – an active but dormant volcano – were to erupt, -- or if an nearby earthquake shook things loose --the western flank of the mountain could tumble into the sea.
Writing in Geophysical Research Letters, they said a build-up of groundwater could destabilize a block of rock up to 500 cubic km in size, which could break off, smashing into the sea at up to 350 km an hour (220 mph).
This landslide will unleash a deadly wall of water, initially almost 3,000 ft. high and several miles wide, hurting towards the US east coast at speeds of up to 800 km an hour (500 mph).
About 8 hours later, waves of about 130-160 feet high would begin smashing into the US east coast, traveling up to TWELVE MILES inland.
ONGOING EARTHQUAKE SWARM
Since January 1, 2019 the IGN has located a seismic series of 60 small earthquakes in the area of Vilaflor in Tenerife at a depth of between 3 and 10 km and magnitudes (mbLg) of between 0.1 and 1.3. None of the events has been felt by the population due to its low magnitude.
In the last 3 months, 170 earthquakes have been located in the zone at an average depth of 7-8 km and of low magnitude being the highest of 2.4.
However, only 6 of these earthquakes exceed the magnitude 1.5
WARNING BUOY OUT OF SERVICE
The United States maintains ocean buoys for various purposes (air temp, water, temp, wave height, Tsunami Warning, etc.) throughout most of the world's oceans.
In the Atlantic, there are Tsunami warning buoys as shown on the image below:
Notice the Tsunami Warning Buoy off the west coast of Africa aligned with the US east coast is colored red . . . . it's OUT OF SERVICE
The National Data Buoy Center admits: "As of 13:00Z, 04/22/2016, the buoy located at station 44401 has ceased transmitting. Data will be restored during our next service visit to this location." That's almost THREE YEARS the buoy has been dead!
The next nearest Tsunami Warning buoy is located off the southern coast of Long Island. Given the speed of a Tsunami, that Buoy would only provide about 20 minutes warning that a deadly wave was approaching the coast.
How to do warn the millions of Americans in New York City, and elsewhere on the east coast, to move to higher ground with only twenty minutes warning?
It is also interesting to note that, despite Seismographs all over the world, the US Geological Survey (USGS) is NOT reporting this earthquake. Why?
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