Seismic Enriquillo fault is reactivated after 240 years

Dominican Republic and Haiti could be at serious risk of "devastating earthquakes", if the seismic pattern detected by a group of American scientists is repeated.

"The 2010 earthquake in Haiti may mark the beginning of a new cycle of large earthquakes in the system of the Enriquillo fault after 240 years of quiet sísimica" conclude researchers, who analyzed all records and communications of tremors since the colonial era until 2010 and considered that system-wide failures Enriquillo "seems to be seismically active".

"The earthquake of 2010 is the evidence that the level of environmental stress regional around the Enriquillo fault system is now sufficient to generate large earthquakes," added the study.

Bakun, Emeritus Scientist of the science of earthquakes of the Institute of Geophysics Center U.S. (U.S. Geological Surve), warned that Haiti and Dominican Republic u000a"they must prepare for future devastating earthquakes throughout the Enriquillo fault system", which lies to the South of Hispaniola.

The study, which was completed in October and will be published this month of February in the Bulletin of the seismological society of America, describes the sequence of earthquakes in the fault during the 18th century and compares them with the latest in 2010, which destroyed much of Port-au-Prince and left as fatal balance at least 225,000 deaths.

"A strength estimated at 6.6 earthquake occurred in 1701 near the site of the 2010 earthquake in Haiti and tremors of 1701 counts are similar to the 2010," says the study.

Infrastructure
the scientists attributed to the lack of preparation the magnitude of the tragedy. "The South of Haiti had been quiet seismically according to the living memory, and the devastating earthquakes in the distant past forgotten by mu chos." But history there, and u000athe first reported severe earthquake took place in what is now North of Dominican Republic, on 2 December 1562.

The first documented in the Southwest was the great earthquake of November 9, 1701, which was followed by two others recorded on 18 October and 21 November 1751. Another occurred in June 1770 to then initiate a period of seismic calm that broke with the jolt of January 12, 2010.

"The earthquake of January 12, 2010 in intensity 7 devastated Port-au-Prince because many structures were vulnerable to even modest levels of tremors," reported quoting the report of the recognition of the ground to murecorrió advanced fair Haitian capital after the quake.

The American specialist explains the study to the 2010 Haiti earthquake "was not a major (seismic) event, but it caused considerable devastation and casualties in Port-au-Prince, in particular by the" u000a"inadequate building practices".

The report stresses that in Dominican Republic and Haiti earthquake risk mitigation efforts should be strengthened to avoid devastating effects in future earthquakes, especially in the South of both countries.

A
not infallible model Bakun and his team recognize that earthquakes are complex phenomena bounding not a model of predictions based on the regeneration of a failure stress and recurrence of earthquakes can shed.

For this reason, scientists believe that "a series of earthquakes damaging in the Enriquillo fault system can occur in the twenty-first century" and that "the sequence of devastating earthquakes in the 18th century shows that the Enriquillo fault is seismically active", say.

The researchers warn that the fact that the fault has been seismically quiet over the past 240 years "is not a" u000a"consuelo".

Study "earthquakes in the system of faults Enriquillo, Hispaniola, 1500-2010: implications for earthquake risk", can be seen in English at:

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TREMOR of 3.9 degrees SE delivers in NAGUA
A tremor of 3.9 degrees on the Richter scale occurred last night in Nagua, in the same region where several regular intensity earthquakes have occurred in the past few days.

The tremor occurred at 9: 25 pm, 19, 6-length 70.2 latitude and at a depth of one kilometer, according to the Centre of operations emergency (COE) that CITES to the Institute seismological of the University Autónoma de Santo Domingo.

According to the COE, the epicentre of the earthquake movement took place 20 kilometres southwest of the town of Nagua, where the authorities assessed the damage caused by the tremors.

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