what is the new madrid seismic zone?
141875
back in the early 19th century a major earthquake occurred that was centered in new madrid, missouri. the entire middle section of the US is considered to be in the zone.
519901
how many and where earthquakes were recorded taking place today
957674
The Pacific Ring of Fire is a zone of frequent earthquakes and volcanic eruptions encircling the basin of the Pacific Ocean. In a 40,000 km horseshoe shape, it is associated with a nearly continuous series of oceanic trenches, island arcs, and volcanic mountain ranges and/or plate movements. It is sometimes called the circum-Pacific belt or the circum-Pacific seismic belt.\n\n90% of the world's earthquakes and 81% of the world's largest earthquakes occur along the Ring of Fire. The next most seismic region (5–6% of earthquakes and 17% of the world's largest earthquakes) is the Alpide belt which extends from Java to Sumatra through the Himalayas, the Mediterranean, and out into the Atlantic. The Mid-Atlantic Ridge is the third most prominent earthquake belt.
22113
Flooding (Flash Flooding), fires, tornados rarely, windstorms (microbursts), and the terrifying possiblity of earthquakes.\n\nArizona is over a deep fault zone that has almost no activity but when it does you will see magnitude 10 earthquakes. \n\nAlong with that, come the volcanic activity. All of Arizona is covered with volcanos. Everything from sunset crater to the superstition mountains and everything in between.
823242
The most famous episode of a human-induced earthquakes began in 1961, when a 3600 meter (12,000 feet) deep disposal well was drilled in the United States Army's Rocky Mountain Arsenal northeast of Denver, Colorado. The well was used for disposing of toxic waste fluids from nerve gas production, and injection commenced in March 1962.\n\nShortly thereafter an unusual series of earthquakes erupted in the area, and by the end of December 1962 about 190 earthquakes had occurred. None caused damage until December, when several structures were damaged in Dupont and Irondale.\n\nOver 1,300 earthquakes were recorded between January 1963 and August 1967. In April 1967 the largest earthquake since the series began in 1962 occurred, and damage was recorded in the arsenal, Derby and Boulder. This tremor measured 5.0 on the Richter scale.\n\nEven after the Rocky Mountain Arsenal waste dumping practice stopped, earthquakes continued to be felt in the Denver area, so in 1968 the Army began removing fluid from the arsenal well very slowly in an effort to reduce the earthquake activity.
1097840
The possibility exists.. The probability is low. \n\nFor what it's worth, It doesn't require a fault to have an earthquake. Keep that in mind. Shifting plate can happen over areas where tectonic plates are non existent. \n\nThere has been measurable earthquakes in the northeast since recording began. \nEven up to a magnitude 7.. \nBelow is a map of recorded historical earthquakes. \nhttp://earthquake.usgs.gov/regional/states/us_damage_eq.php
460543
Pretty much the entire city rests on the Hayward Fault Zone, so I'd say everywhere. Which isn't to say that the entire place will collapse due to Earthquakes, but it is on a fault line so there will be seismic activity.
568106
I'd say the chances are really good. There was a 3.1 earthquake on May 06, 2006 about 20 miles SW of Trinidad, Colorado (190 miles south of Denver).\n\nBetween August 28 and September 21, 2001 there was a swarm of 12 measuring from 2.8 to 4.6 near Trinidad.
393008
Yes.  The New Madrid Fault line made an earthquake 8.4 in 1811.  It made the Mississippi Rive flow backwards.  It has not had a major release since, but small 3.0's and 4.0's occur all the time.  Check out this website.  \n\nhttp://erp-web.er.usgs.gov/reports/abstract/1996/cu/g2733.htm\n\n\nhttp://earthquake.usgs.gov/
725321
Places that are less geologically active, and less prone to quakes, should be away from subduction zones, away from hot spots and volcanoes, and in very old stable landmasses, like in the center of continents as long as it is not a young mountain range.\nThere are a few places, but it is likely they will have some other undesirable characteristics, like foul weather, pests, or lack of ressources.  The following link shows where the most recent earthquakes occured, the second one shows which area are more affected.
556155
(m)\n\nAustralian and American researchers investigating forces exerted on the Indo-Australian tectonic plate have discovered that the considerable stresses being exerted on the plate could be leading to its breaking up.\n\nARC Professorial Fellow, Mike Sandiford, from the University of Melbourne’s School of Earth Sciences was recently awarded ARC funding for research aimed at understanding the forces that drive the motion of the Earth’s tectonic plates and the distribution of stresses in the Earth’s crust that give rise to great earthquakes such as the magnitude 9 Boxing Day Sumatran quake.\n\nProfessor Sandiford says the research shows that as much as 10 per cent of the huge amounts of energy being created at plate connection points at Sumatra and Java are being transferred back into our plate and causing major stresses.\n\n“This is enough stress to contribute to mild earthquake activity in the central regions of the plate, such as in the Australian continent or central Indian Ocean, and provides us with clues as to why our plate has been slowly breaking up,” he says.\n\n“The Indian Ocean quakes are, in effect, leading to the active rupture of the Indo-Australian plate into separate Indian and Australian plates. This new research provides us with important information about the stresses that are driving this drawn out tectonic plate divorce.”\n\nThe research, which was conducted in collaboration with Wouter Pieter Schellart of the Australian National University and David Coblentz of the Los Alamos National Laboratory in the US, will be published in the journal Geology (27 January).\n\nThe research is also important for understanding why smaller intra-plate earthquakes such as the 1989 Newcastle quake, which occurred nowhere near the edge of the plate, take place. Up to now, why earthquakes occur in apparently safe zones in the centre of plates has not been very well understood.\n\nProfessor Sandiford says, “Earthquakes such as the 1989 Newcastle quake that killed 13 people and caused more than $1 billion in damages are just one manifestation of mild tectonic activity that has been affecting the Australian continent for the last 5-10 million years.”\n\nThe new research shows that stresses originating at points of collision between two plates are being dissipated back into our plate and generating enormous internal stresses.\n\nThe ARC funded project will map the spatial and temporal pattern of this tectonic activity and relate it to the factors that drive the motion of the Indo-Australian plate.\n\n“This research will contribute to our understanding of the factors that drive plate motion, to earthquake risk assessment in Australia and other comparatively stable continental regions, and to the factors that have shaped our distinctive Australian landscapes,” he says.\n\nBACKGROUND INFORMATION\n\nWhat causes tectonic plates to move?\nThe Earth is made up of a series of layers. The outermost layer is called the crust and the innermost is the core. In between lies an area called the mantle (in turn made up of upper and lower mantle), which is arguably the most important when it comes to understanding where big earthquakes occur.\n\nThe outer part of the Earth, comprising the crust and top 100 or so kilometres of the mantle (together called the lithosphere), consists of a collection of eight major plates which almost fit perfectly together. The continents and oceans all lie on these plates, the major ones referred to as the African, Eurasian, Indo-Australian, Antarctic, Philippine, Pacific, Nazca, North American and South American, depending on their geographic location.\n\nThese plates (also referred to as tectonic plates) float on the softer mantle underneath. Convection currents within the upper mantle layer are a major driving force driving plate motion and therefore behind earthquake activity.\n\nThe lower sections of the mantle closest to the molten core of the earth are also the hottest parts of this la
31391
An earthquake is a sudden and sometimes catastrophic movement of a part of the Earth's surface. Earthquakes result from the dynamic release of elastic strain energy that radiates seismic waves. Earthquakes typically result from the movement of faults, planar zones of deformation within the Earth's upper crust. The word earthquake is also widely used to indicate the source region itself. The Earth's lithosphere is a patch work of plates in slow but constant motion (see plate tectonics). Earthquakes occur where the stress resulting from the differential motion of these plates exceeds the strength of the crust. The highest stress (and possible weakest zones) are most often found at the boundaries of the tectonic plates and hence these locations are where the majority of earthquakes occur. Events located at plate boundaries are called interplate earthquakes; the less frequent events that occur in the interior of the lithospheric plates are called intraplate earthquakes (see, for example, New Madrid Seismic Zone). Earthquakes related to plate tectonics are called tectonic earthquakes. Most earthquakes are tectonic, but they also occur in volcanic regions and as the result of a number of anthropogenic sources, such as reservoir induced seismicity, mining and the removal or injection of fluids into the crust. Seismic waves including some strong enough to be felt by humans can also be caused by explosions (chemical or nuclear), landslides, and collapse of old mine shafts, though these sources are not strictly earthquakes.\n\nThere's too much details so just click on the link,\ni hope this helps.
217048
http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/hottopics/naturaldisasters/earthquakes.shtml
1042537
While it is true that SC is considered a passive zone, it does not mean that we don't have earthquakes. Actually SC has a history of earthquakes though most of them are small when compared to those in California. In other words, they don't make the major network news reports. For instance, in February of last year we experienced a 2.9 (RS) quake in Columbia. Most of these small quakes occur in the Piedmont areas. In the last few years there have been several to the west of my location. For more info follow on the earthquake mentioned above follow this link... http://www.dnr.sc.gov/geology/images/Earthquake02-18-05.pdf\n\nAs far as knowing when a major earthquake will occur in SC, that is hard to tell. Earthquake prediction is a tricky business.\n\nThe greatest damage would most likely occur on the coastal plain due to liquefaction. That is where loose unconsolidated sediments/soil when shaken become like a liquid. In the case of a larger quake, this is a hazard not for folks just near the "fault line" but for any area on the coastal plain.\n\nThe link below is a map showing the major faults in SC.\nhttp://www.dnr.sc.gov/geology/images/Fault_Map_Generalized.gif\n\nThis link will take you to the USGS's latest earthquake occurrence map (w/in past 7 days). As you can see the west coast has been busy! http://earthquake.usgs.gov/eqcenter/recenteqsus/\n\nThe link below gives you the southeast's earthquakes in the past 6 months. As you can see, SC hasn't had any recently.\nhttp://folkworm.ceri.memphis.edu/recenteqs/
1044728
The foci of earthquakes at transform boundaries tend to be at shallow depths.\n\nSee source.
874879
About 1,800 miles beneath the surface, Earth's internal structure changes abruptly where the solid rock of the mantle meets the swirling molten iron of the outer core. \nBut the boundary between the core and the mantle may not be as sharply defined as scientists once thought. By analyzing earthquake waves that bounce off the core-mantle boundary, researchers have found evidence of a thin zone where the outermost core is more solid than fluid.\n\nThe existence of such "core-rigidity zones" -- small patches of rigid material within the fluid outer core -- has been suggested before, but this report marks the first time scientists have detected one.
832796
The Geological Survey of Canada said the epicentre of the quake was about five kilometres from the town of Lively, west of Sudbury. It rattled the region at 2:22 a.m.