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Geology News
Oregon Current Events

Earthquake swarms are typically associated with an impending volcanic eruption. The earthquake swarms detected off the coast of Oregon are anything but typical, however; there are no volcanoes in the vicinity. To add to the mystery, the quakes are originating in the middle of the Juan de Fuca Plate, instead of at the boundary, where they would normally occur.

There were many mercury mines in Oregon in the early 1900s. The miners dug up the ore, heated it and then cooled the vapors to condense the liquid mercury. Now, a century later some sites in the Ochoco National Forest and on private lands remain contaminated from these activities.

A pair of earthquakes of magnitude 5.1 and 4.9 struck early Monday morning about 200 miles off the Oregon Coast. No damage was reported and no tsunami was produced.

USGS Report on the magnitude 5.1

An article at GEOTIMES documents the removal of Marmot Dam from the Sandy River in northwestern Oregon. Learn what happens when a hydroelectric dam is removed from a river after more than 90 years.

A strong earthquake shook a sparsely populated area in northeast Nevada this morning. The “did you feel it” map on the USGS website shows intensity VI effects felt near the epicenter with reports of ground shaking in adjacent areas of Utah, Idaho and Oregon. Early news reports include some damaged buildings but no casualties.

Early Tuesday morning a fireball illuminated the sky with a streak and explosion near Portland, Oregon. More details are given on the GEOTIMES website.

USGS has published a report titled “Variations in City Exposure and Sensitivity to Tsunami Hazards in Oregon”. Here is part of what they say about it…. “Evidence of past events and modeling of potential future events suggest that tsunamis are significant threats to Oregon coastal communities….. a potential tsunami-inundation zone from a Cascadia Subduction Zone earthquake has been delineated.”

In early December landslides filled the Chehalis River Valley with water and debris. Now environmentalists and scientists say that Weyerhaeuser’s timbering practices were a major contribution to the conditions responsible for the slides.

USGS reports a magnitude 6.4 earthquake off the Oregon coast about 151 miles west of Barview, Oregon. No tsunami was observed or expected. The earthquake was about 100 miles from shore. The USGS “did you feel it?” map is not showing reports that the event was felt on land.

“What Bugged the Dinosaurs?” is a new book that proposes that insects and disease may have played a more important role in the demise of the dinosaurs. It is authored by George Poinar (Oregon State University) and Roberta Poinar (retired research scientist). It was published by Princeton University Press.

Bill Burns of the Oregon Department of Geology and Mineral Industries has an interesting PowerPoint presentation on the Woodson Debris Flow that recently happened in northwestern Oregon. It has a number of maps and images, plus some personal mitigation advice for those who live where these events might occur.

This is a video of a flood and mudflow that destroyed buildings and forced the closing of US Route 30 near Clatskanie, Oregon. The Oregon Department of Transportation closed the road and evacuated residents shortly before the slide occurred. [CNN Video]   [Oregon Live News Report]

Earth Observatory has a cumulative rainfall map for the storms that recently drenched Washington and Oregon. It shows over 150 millimeters of precipitation between November 28 and December 4. The Seattle area received over 100 millimeters of rain.

NOAA Image

Flooding, landslides, heavy rain and high winds have given the Washington and Oregon areas a beating. Lots of roads are underwater or blocked by landslides, thousands are without power and many people need rescued from their home.

OSU Image

From the article: “A new study by researchers at Oregon State University has identified a soldier beetle, preserved almost perfectly in amber, which was in the process of using chemical repellents to fight off an attacker when an oozing flow of sap preserved the struggle for eternity.”

Unesco Image

Researchers at Oregon State University are building a scale model of Seaside, a tourist destination town on the Oregon coast. It is being built at 1/50th scale in a wave simulation tank. They will then model what a 35-foot-tall tsunami will do to the town. Why? The Cascadia subduction zone is just offshore and a large tsunami generated there would strike the coast in only 15 to 20 minutes. They hope to answer questions such as… Should people downtown do a horizontal evacuation and travel inland or should they do a vertical evacuation and head for the upper floors of the town’s taller buildings?

Oregon

State geologists in Oregon say that 46% of the 2200 K-12 schools in that state are at “High” or “Very High” risk of collapse during an earthquake. Part of the reason for this problem is that most school buildings were built at least 40 years ago - before current earthquake resistant standards were required. The Oregon Office of Emergency Management is supposed to set up a fund to help the schools with greatest need retrofit their buildings.

CIA Image

Earth and Sky has recordings of underwater sounds from Antarctica posted on their website. Go there to hear the sound of an underwater earthquake or a passing humpback whale. These are quicktime files that will click and play on most computers. These sounds were obtained by hydrophones operated by researchers from Oregon State University and NOAA.