Massive Fault Line in New Zealand's 'Alps' May be the Secret to Future Earthquakes

There is something intrinsically frightening about earthquakes. I remember watching the 1936 movie San Francisco, starring Clark Gable, Jeanette MacDonald and Spencer Tracy. A wonderful movie which won an Oscar and was nominated for 5 others, all I can remember is the earthquake scenes, depicting the massive 1906 earthquake. Horses were squealing, houses were falling, and I was not very old. Needless to say, it left a memory.

Now, in an attempt to understand more about earthquakes, and in particular the big ones, an international group of scientists are hoping that New Zealand may offer up some secrets.

The South Island of New Zealand is home to the Southern Alps, a mountain range that runs along almost the entire western side. However these beautiful mountains are a sinister cover for what lies beneath: the Alpine Fault.

Known as a right-lateral strike-slip fault, the Alpine Fault is the cause for the beautiful mountains above, but also four major ruptures measuring in at about 8 on the Richter scale, over the past thousand years. What is not surprising considering its return to the news is that the Alpine Fault could experience another magnitude 8 – capable of destroying much of the South Island – anytime now.

But the researchers are not looking at prevention, or at least, not immediately. The scientists want to drill a 5 kilometer hole in to the fault in Mt. Cook National Park, in an experiment they hope will give them an insight in to the changes within a fault. By drilling such a hole, they will be able to look at changes in the underlying rock, and discern whether the fault is being lubricated by fluids under high pressure.

"We can take advantage of a rare window into the physical character of the seismologically expressed brittle-ductile transition zone in a fault that is active today and which can be geophysically monitored in the coming decades," the researchers in the International Continental Scientific Drilling Program (ICDP) say on their website.

"Establishment of a fault-hosted observatory will allow continuous observation of a fault that is late in its earthquake cycle," said a principal investigator John Townend, a Victoria University geophysicist and Earthquake Commission fellow in seismic studies, and the man who proposed the drillhole.

A similar observatory has been set up at the San Andreas Fault in California. The San Andreas Fault Observatory at Depth (Safod) recently used a similar drillhole to observe geophysical changes underground prior to the occurrence of small earthquakes.

Posted by Josh Hill.

http://stuff.co.nz/4622024a7693.html

Comments

[George Williams]

To Whom It May Concern

Today I passed on a letter of deep concern on contingency plans for drivers of Coaches on the West Coast if, we do experience the big one (so to speak).
Nothing but nothing is notified to us drivers and no plans available. Mind you I would be responsible for my own passengers with the skills I posses as a past Ambulance Officer and Enforcement Officer.
Regards
George.

[George Williams]

To Whom It May Concern

Today I passed on a letter of deep concern on contingency plans for drivers of Coaches on the West Coast if, we do experience the big one (so to speak).
Nothing but nothing is notified to us drivers and no plans available. Mind you I would be responsible for my own passengers with the skills I posses as a past Ambulance Officer and Enforcement Officer.
Regards
George.