Oklahoma Earthquakes
What's with all the earthquakes in Oklahoma recently? That area between Medford to Langston and down to Edmond & Jones is getting a really serious shaking these past few months. I expect to see a lot of earthquakes in California and Alaska and a number of very minor ones in the Puget Sound area of WA, but Oklahoma?
Larry ---sagefisher---
Oklahoma looks pretty flat today, but it is the home to some of the oldest mountains in the country, they've just all been eroded off at the top. Below the ground level, there is still some pretty complicated geology with some very big faults. These faults have not been very active in recorded history, but recently we have been seeing more activity. The best theory about the cause of these earthquakes is that the faults have been lubricated by the injection of "waste water".
Waste water wells are drilled into deep rock formations for the purpose of disposing of water that comes from producing oil and gas wells. When an oil well produces oil, it also produces a large amount of water. This water is pretty nasty stuff and we don't want to keep it on the surface, so it is injected back underground. If the disposal wells are drilled into faulted zones, the rock is more fractured and can absorb more of the waste water. If the faults are prone to slipping, the water lubricating the fault helps it to slip sooner rather than later.
Best Regards,
Ted
there was a segment on the weather channel about this just 30 minutes ago, and they asked the question if all of the fracking for oil and NG has had any effect on this in OK. they stated there had been 200 quakes in OK this year if I heard things correctly.
Our K-State geology professor in 1975 told us all about the Kansas Earthquake Belt----that was a real eye opener. Then he went on to discuss how we will be destroyed when Yellowstone eventually blows up. It's not a matter of "if" it's "when". I rode my motorcycle through Yellowstone last year and it looked okay. We might have a few years left yet.
The newest earthquake fault was named after a famous quote by a newly wed husband and became known as "the NotMy Fault".
If you take the interstate out of Denver down to Albuquerque along side the road is what is unmistakably the top of a volcano. If you fly from northern NM to El Paso it is amazing how many dormant volcanic cones are visible and alongside I-40 east of the AZ state line are several miles of frozen lava. You have concerns a lot closer than Yellowstone.Originally Posted by Jtaylor
Want to hear God laugh? Tell him Your plans!!!
The picture of a cliff on the old Coors labels is from South Table Mountain which sits directly above the Coors brewery in Golden, CO. The cliff is basalt from a lava flow, but it's been a few 10's of millions of years since it happened.
Ted
That said, if I live in Oklahoma, I would spend more time and money preparing for things coming out of the skies than out of the earth.
Want to hear God laugh? Tell him Your plans!!!
no worries man...according to the BEST science, fracking and water injection don't cause ANY problems whatsoever.
"Trust, but verify" - Russian Proverb, as used by Ronald Reagan
In times of drought Native Americans would perform rain dances. It would always rain, sooner or later.
Chubby Checker came along with a new dance in the late 50's/early 60's known as the Twist. Oklahoma had in influx of tornados.
Now we have all this Hip Hop dancing going on. I'm not surprised there are earthquakes.
Or it could be caused by Fracking. http://www.latimes.com/opinion/topof...627-story.html
I'm either going to, coming from or thinking about fishing. Jim
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