Watch: Earthquake hits Oklahoma, felt in Texas

[TexasTowelie]

Source: Austin American-Statesman

The magnitude-4.7 earthquake that rattled the northern town of Medford, Oklahoma early this morning could be felt as far Texas, the Weather Channel reported. Originally registered at magnitude-4.5, the quake was upgraded to a 4.7 a few hours after, making it the state’s strongest earthquake of 2015. Another 4.7 shook the state just 11 days earlier, during a month in which the state has seen a record number of magnitude-4 or higher earthquakes.

Several people reported feeling tremors in Lovelady, Texas — more than 650 miles away. Currently no damages or injuries have been reported.

The earthquake follows a power outage affecting more than 70,000 after a storm hit the area with ice and freezing rain.

Read more: http://weather.blog.statesman.com/2015/11/30/watch-earthquake-hits-oklahoma-felt-in-texas/

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Video at link.

[LiberalArkie]

1. Isn't fracking wonderful. Everyone in our area gets to feel like they are in California.

[ruffburr]

2. How's that Fracking working out for Ya?

[yeoman6987]

6. Problem is New Mexico is a huge fracking state but no earthquakes

A study needs to be done in Oklahoma to find out for sure what is going on.

[Tempest]

9. To call NM a huge fracking state is a gross overstatement

Fracking in NM is limited to two small areas of the state, the northwest and southeast corners.

Fracking in Oklahoma is statewide.

[yeoman6987]

19. Thank you for the correction

Speaking without full knowledge again.

[Kingofalldems]

24. Thanks for correcting him.

[longship]

8. I really loved it when an earthquake hit California...

...and a DUer responded, "Is there fracking there?"

Dumb... DE Dumb-Dumb.

Whether or not there is fracking, there are earthquakes in CA every fscking day, no matter where you are in CA.

Not every earthquake on the planet is from fucking fracking. There are many places there is fracking which have no earthquakes. And CA has many hundreds of earthquakes every year, whether or not there is fracking.

Now, am I saying we should frack? Nope! I think we should not. However, this earthquake == fracking stuff has got to stop here. Correlation does not mean causation and an earthquake does not mean fracking.

Would I recommend fracking in an earthquake zone? I would not recommend fracking anywhere. And certainly not because of earthquakes. Or ground water.

[Tempest]

10. However

Earthquakes were practically non-existent in Oklahoma before fracking was started.

Now earthquakes are daily there.

http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2014/08/man-made-earthquakes-are-altering-the-geologic-landscape/372243/

[longship]

11. Again, correlation does not mean causation.

What do the geologists say?

And what does practically non-existent mean?

Anecdotal evidence is not science. And earthquake causation is likely multi-factorial. If one is getting earthquakes with fracking one likely would be getting them without fracking. There are many places with fracking which do not have earthquakes. And there are lots of places with earthquakes without fracking. Therefore, fracking cannot be the sole cause of earthquakes.

**The question is Does fracking in an earthquake zone increase the number of earthquakes? That is a question for geologists, not some random person on a Inet forum.

So it is safe to say that it is likely that these earthquakes are not solely from fracking. My ** question is the one that needs to be answered by a qualified expert in the field.

[Tempest]

13. Geologists and scientists say there's a direct relationship. Including OK's own Geological Survey

But I suspect you already knew that.

And the seismic record of Oklahoma for the last 150 years shows few earthquakes a year before fracking. Now there's hundreds a month. That's not anecdotal evidence, that's hard science.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/22/us/oklahoma-acknowledges-wastewater-from-oil-and-gas-wells-as-major-cause-of-quakes.html

http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/04/21/us-oklahoma-fracking-quakes-idUSKBN0NC2F220150421

http://kfor.com/2015/04/21/oklahoma-geological-survey-earthquakes-linked-to-oil-and-gas-activity/

https://stateimpact.npr.org/oklahoma/tag/earthquakes/

http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/31673-frackquake-madness-35-fracking-earthquakes-rock-oklahoma-in-a-week-regulators-call-event-a-game-changer

[longship]

14. I did not know that.

But I also suspect that there would only be tremblers if there was an active fault in the fracking region.

BTW, I think fracking is horrible. But the reason to oppose them goes far beyond the tremblers.

[progree]

22. How one US state went from two quakes a year to 585

How one US state went from two quakes a year to 585

The central US state of Oklahoma has gone from registering two earthquakes a year to nearly two a day and scientists point to a controversial culprit: wastewater injection wells used in fracking.

Located in the middle of the country, far from any major fault lines, Oklahoma experienced 585 earthquakes of a magnitude of 3.0 or greater in 2014. That's more than three times as many as the 180 which hit California last year.

As of last month, Oklahoma has already experienced more than 600 quakes strong enough to rattle windows and rock cars. The biggest was a 4.5-magnitude quake that hit the small town of Crescent.

.... From 1975 to 2008, the state experienced anywhere from zero to three earthquakes a year which registered at 3.0 or higher. Then the numbers jumped: there were 20 in 2009, 35 in 2010, 64 in 2011, 35 in 2012, 109 in 2013 and 585 in 2014.

More: http://news.yahoo.com/one-us-state-went-two-quakes-585-054259418.html

The source of this article is Agence France-Presse (AFP). Yahoo is just the news aggregator which posts news from multiple sources, e.g. similarly news.google.com

Even the Republican Oklahoma governor has accepted the link between fracking (particularly the injection of waste water into the ground) and earthquakes.

Gov. Mary Fallin acknowledges “direct correlation” between earthquakes and disposal wells
http://kfor.com/2015/08/04/gov-mary-fallin-acknowledges-direct-correlation-between-earthquakes-and-disposal-wells/

[LanternWaste]

16. Entertaining how your facts changed his premise.

Entertaining how your facts changed his premise.

[Tempest]

18. He could have saved himself the embarrassment

With a simple Google search.

[olddad56]

23. nice rant, born and raised in CA. never been impacted by an earthquake in my 67 years of living here

I have felt a couple, and they have a had a few big ones in my lifetime, but none that impacted me. Had they ever had one in Oklahoma or the Dakotas prior to fracking? Was in a huge one in Montana in 1962 while on vacation. Floods are a bigger concern for me, obviously not during the drought.

[Tempest]

25. You would have been impacted if you lived in the Bay area

The 1989 quake pretty much shut down major travel routes in the Bay area for weeks.

"Had they ever had one in Oklahoma or the Dakotas prior to fracking? "

Oklahoma averaged about one a year before fracking. Now it's 500+ a year after fracking.

[Manifestor_of_Light]

3. Damn, I know exactly where Lovelady is.

I am north of there but didn't feel anything. But I was probably either asleep or feeding cats.

[TexasTowelie]

5. Oh yeah, blame it on the cats--

it's always a convenient excuse!

[Stevepol]

20. I've lived in Wichita KS for thirty years,

and I never felt an earthquake until the last two years. I've felt 4 now, the last two 4.7 M.

[Laffy Kat]

27. I once felt one in Memphis while I was sitting on the floor.

Can't remember the magnitude but it was an eye-opener. Memphis sits on the New Madrid fault line... "Any day" they say. Haven't lived there in over 30 years, though.

[Behind the Aegis]

4. I felt that one last night/this morning.

I was actually reading DU and my chair rocked and vape pen on my desk almost fell over.

[cascadiance]

7. Get rid of those frackin' Cylon companies!!!

[Runningdawg]

12. Worst case senario

a big one hits, Cushing falls into a sink hole and every well for 100 miles around blows. Remember those pictures of Iraq during GWI and the oil wells burning? A drop in the bucket. Those wells were in the desert, the wells in question here are in populated areas. Cushing is also within 100 miles of OKs 2 largest cities, the 2 largest state universities AND Keystone dam. This is a recipe for unprecedented disaster in the US. The fires from the wells will pollute the air, the oil on the ground will pollute the water, kill the crops and livestock, and if the dam goes, all bets are off, it will make Katrina and Sandy look like a walk in the park.

[valerief]

15. Feb 2015 story about fracking and earthquakes in Medford OK.

http://www.npr.org/2015/02/16/386693615/with-quakes-spiking-oil-industry-is-under-the-microscope-in-oklahoma

Holland says that Oklahoma used to have, on average, one or two perceptible earthquakes a year. Now the state is averaging two or three a day. There were more magnitude 3 or greater tremors here last year than anywhere else in the continental United States, and the unprecedented spike in earthquakes has intensified.

Holland suspects that modern oil production techniques are triggering the jump in quakes. A few years back, companies figured out how to drill sideways through layers of shale, then break, or frack, the rock, releasing a torrent of oil.

[madokie]

17. I'm east of there

about 175 maybe 200 miles or so and I never felt a thing. Why o why do I miss out on all the fun.

Just in case

A repeat of this will not be good: http://www.new-madrid.mo.us/index.aspx?NID=102

[Marrah_G]

21. There are fault lines in Oklahoma

[MuseRider]

26. We have been feeling them

all the way up into NE Kansas. One shook pretty good I hear, I slept through it.

[lunasun]

28. Frack on !