Scientists fear that a hole in the 965-mile-long fault line in the Pacific could trigger a terrible earthquake that will destroy cities in the northwestern United States. This geological feature could cause a magnitude 9 earthquake in the Pacific Northwest. The hot liquid blast hole is located 80 kilometers off the Oregon coastline on the boundary of a plunging fault, known as the Cascadia Subduction Zone, which stretches from Northern California to Canada.
Fluid eruption was first observed in 2015. But now, a new analysis led by the University of Washington (UW) suggests that the chemically distinct fluid is a “fault lubricant.”
This fluid allows the plates to move smoothly, but without this fluid, “stress can build up to create a damaging earthquake,” the researchers said.
The team named the hole, which they described as a hot spring, the “Oasis of Pythias,” in honor of the ancient Greek oracle who “prophesied” with the help of mind-altering gases rising from a hot spring. “Finding a source of low-salt, high-temperature, mineral-rich water flowing from the seafloor 1,000 meters below the surface off the Oregon coast seems similarly hallucinatory,” the researchers said in a statement.
In a 2015 study, the hole was found when bubbles rising from the seafloor were identified in sonar images taken by a robotic diver. The data showed that the fluid from the source came from the plate boundary line and appeared to be hotter than the surrounding area.
“They explored in that direction and what they saw was not just methane bubbles, it was water coming out of the seafloor like a fire hose,” co-author Evan Solomon, a UW associate professor of oceanography who studies seafloor geology, said in a statement. something that has not been observed before.”
Subsequent observations determined that the seeping fluid was 16 degrees Fahrenheit (about 9 degrees Celsius) warmer than the surrounding seawater and came directly from the Cascadia major earthquake zone with an estimated temperature of 150 to 260 degrees Celsius.
Cascadia major earthquake zone
The Cascadia major earthquake zone covers several major metropolitan areas, including Seattle and Portland, Oregon, as well as parts of Northern California and Vancouver Island in Canada. Solomon likens the great earthquake fault zone to an air hockey table: “If the fluid pressure is high, it’s like the air has opened up, which means there’s less friction and the two plates can slide. If the fluid pressure is lower, the two plates are locked – then stress can build up.”
The Cascadia subduction zone is a region where two tectonic plates collide. The research shows that the fault was ruptured in a nine-magnitude earthquake around 1700. The fluid released from the fault zone is the first known site of its kind, Solomon said. However, it is also stated that they estimate that similar sources are more difficult to detect from the ocean surface, although they are located nearby.
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