Earthquake shakes southern Ohio

[KamaAina]

Source: Columbus Dispatch

Southern Ohio received a good shaking this afternoon when an earthquake centered north of Athens rattled the region.

The U.S. Geological Survey reported a 3.5-magnitude earthquake shook the area at 12:59 p.m. The earthquake's epicenter was 4.9 miles deep about 2.5 miles east-southeast of Nelsonville.

The agency’s website received reports of the tremor being felt principally in southern Ohio, and into West Virginia, with some people in the Columbus area also reporting they felt the ground shake.

There were no immediate reports of damage. The Richter Scale, which is used to rate the intensity of earthquakes, indicates a 3.5-magnitude earthquake is noticeable indoors, but generally does not cause damage.

Read more: http://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/local/2013/11/20/Southern-Ohio-earthquake.html

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Ohio?! Is this area being fracked, by any chance?

[Botany]

1. Awesome country

although it sounds like it was centered along the Hocking "The Amazon of Ohio" River but I love this
little patch of Prairie which is near by.

[hobbit709]

2. I can remember a couple of shakes in the area in the 60's, long before fracking.

[Half-Century Man]

3. There is a fault line in the midwest

the New Madrid fault line can effect the Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Kentucky, and Tennessee areas. I saw a program on the History Channel about it. They said the brick structures in Memphis were a real hazard if an earthquake approaching 7+ were to happen.

[Lindsay]

4. I went to college in Athens,

many, many years ago. Earthquakes were not unheard of even back then.

[Trailrider1951]

21. Hey, me too

Graduated from OU in March 1980 with a BS in Geology. Ohio does get small (< 4.0) earthquakes occaisionally, due to isostatic rebound from the last glaciation. This one was probably not caused by fracking.

[longship]

5. Earthquakes are generally naturally occurring events.

Just because there's an earthquake doesn't mean there's fracking.

Fracking is not good. But fracking hysteria does not help the cause. There are plenty of good reasons to oppose fracking. Labeling every earthquake as fracking does not help that cause.

Sorry.

[KamaAina]

7. Earthquakes of that magnitude are becoming more common

in places that don't normally have them but do have fracking, like Oklahoma and Arkansas.

[longship]

8. Correlation does not imply causation.

That's a primary given in science. Just because there's an earthquake someplace does not mean its fracking. Even if there is fracking in the area!

Yes. Fracking can disturb geological strata. And there is some evidence for a causal connection. But to then conclude that every time there's an earthquake it's caused by fracking is delusional.

I felt many earthquakes when I lived in CA. But I remember one in the early 80's when I lived in Royal Oak, MI. I was watching Bill Kennedy on CKLW-TV, an iconic movie host in Detroit. Sitting on the floor I felt a shudder that lasted some ten seconds. At the next commercial break Bill Kennedy announced that there was an earthquake, which he felt, too.

There are faults all over the planet which cause quakes. One does not need to frack to produce them. They just happen naturally.

[Art_from_Ark]

11. The Arkansas quakes have dramatically declined

since a moratorium was placed on deep injection wells, according to the Arkansas Geological Survey.

http://stateimpact.npr.org/pennsylvania/2011/09/20/does-fracking-cause-earthquakes/

[longship]

12. That has nothing at all to do with the OH earthquake.

Science is a bitch. One must always hold ones opinion up to what nature really is telling you. And nature is science's bitch. Science does not tell nature what to do. Nature tells science what is fact. And that is why scientific findings are both tentative, and provisional.

People who don't see this, and people who, once they've heard that fracking can cause tremblers, presume that all earthquakes must therefore be caused by fracking, are likely making an ideological conclusion and not one on any scientific basis.

I will stand by my previous post until evidence suggests otherwise. Then, if the evidence is backed up by a modicum of some scientific consensus, I will buy into it, until it doesn't.

Present evidence that this has any connection to fracking and I will gladly recant. Note that this is another aspect of real science. I don't have any dog in this hunt. I just doubt your conclusion.

[Art_from_Ark]

14. Here is what you wrote in the post I was replying to:

"Yes. Fracking can disturb geological strata. And there is some evidence for a causal connection."

In the case of the Arkansas earthquakes, at least, the state's geological survey believes there is *ample* evidence for a causal connection. The Ohio quake may or may not have been caused by fracking, but the state is littered with fracking wells and it is a distinct possibility that at least some Ohio quakes can be attributed to fracking.

[longship]

17. Again, correlation does not equate to causation.

And again, science isn't done by correlations. They are meaningless. Even if there was fracking in the area, which I sincerely doubt -- I invite you to present your evidence to the contrary -- what evidence do you have that this specific earthquake has anything to do with fracking?

BTW, I hate fracking. But science is science. If there is anything I hate more than fracking it's people who, like a knee jerk, see any minor trembler as caused by fracking.

Where is the evidence that this specific trembler was caused by fracking? And no, correlation is not going to convince anybody, least of all those of us who are educated in science.

Again, if there is actual evidence beyond correlation, I will gladly recant. If there isn't, will you? Or are now all earthquakes caused by fracking? That would be ideological thinking, which I hope people would reject.

[Botany]

19. You are right

i went to school not far from there (15 miles @ the most) and a number of small
natural faults occur in Ohio. Ohio U in Athens, OH.



The Starr Fault System is right smack under the epicenter of the quake.

Now in N.E. OH we have had earthquakes that have been proven to be linked to
either fracking or injection wells to a high degree of certainty.

[longship]

20. Your point is well (no pun intended) taken.

Yes! Fracking can generate tremblers. But they will probably not be very damaging if they are in low risk areas.

There are many reasons to oppose fracking. The least of them are earthquakes.

[mackdaddy]

23. There are Deep injection Wells withing a few miles of the Nelsonvile epicenter

I live about 15 miles from the quakes epicenter. There is a deep injection well less than a mile from me.
I did not know that there was a fault nearby, but it looks like there are active deep injection wells located on both sides of where the fault lies.

Is this absolute "proof" that there is a causation, No. But it is worth looking into.

Here is the State of Ohio injection well locations map from the ODNR:
http://oilandgas.ohiodnr.gov/portals/oilgas/pdf/ClassIIBrineInjectionWellsofOhio_10-29-2013.pdf

Ohio does not have the number of fracking wells as in PA, but supposedly much of the leftover "brine" from PA fracked wells is trucked here to Ohio to be put into our deep injection wells as PA restricted injection wells.

Note that SE Ohio does have MANY old abandoned coal mines, so that is another possible contributor.

[Marthe48]

6. Ohio okay'd fracking

Some of our Dem. state representatives and an anti-fracking organization are asking questions about ground water protection and other concerns:

http://www.ohio.com/blogs/drilling/ohio-utica-shale-1.291290/hundred-letter-writers-seek-hearing-on-athens-county-injection-well-1.428471

We live live n.e of Athens, but didn't feel this quake. We did feel the two that happened east of us last spring, which are probably from fracking. All you see around here are pipes, pipe trucks, and brine trucks. And a company is going to build a cracker plant in Wood County, West Virginia.

[longship]

13. See my post, #12 nt

[IkeRepublican]

9. This is nothing

I survived the December 3rd 1990 earthquake.

Yeah. Remember that monumental hoax?

[uppityperson]

10. New Madrid fault line?

[KamaAina]

15. That's several hundred miles away

between St. Louis and Memphis. Neither of which have California-style earthquake building codes.

[Art_from_Ark]

16. No, the New Madrid fault line lies in Missouri, Arkansas, and Tennessee,

somewhat parallel to the Mississippi River (or at least along the old river path before it was diverted by the 1811-12 New Madrid Quake). A quake registering 3.3 in Ohio and originating at the New Madrid fault would have been felt, and at a much greater magnitude, along that part of the Mississippi River.

[PassingFancy]

18. Ohio had earthquakes in the 1950's, 1960's, and 1970's long, long before fracking

I was born and raised in Ohio - I was born in 1953 and lived in Ohio all but 4 years from 1953 through 1980, and we had earthquakes all of the time - usually no more than 3.5 in magnitude - and that was a very very long time before fracking in Ohio.

I have to laugh at people getting overly upset over these tiny earthquakes. How about if they had to live through the Nisqually Earthquake here in Washington State - it was first reported as being a 6.8 magnitude but later upgraded to a 7.2 magnitude. I was home from work sick when it hit. I was sitting on our couch watching TV and saw the walls "breathe" and could feel the floor swaying. I could not get up from the couch - I wanted to so I could go to the door and see the road in front of our house "rolling/wavering" like I've heard it does. That quake was felt many, many miles away with damage.

I know what we had here in Washington State doesn't compare to those quakes that are 8.0 and above; but, it was pretty wild for about a couple of minutes. And, I've lived in Washington State since 1984 and we feel mild earthquakes all of the time - after a couple of years of feeling them, we ignore them as they happen so often (those that are from a 1.0 to a 3.5 magnitude are ignored by the greater majority of us in the Puget Sound Region - Western Washington).