Scientists tracking earthquake swarm in northern Yellowstone Park
The
small earthquake that struck Yellowstone National Park on Thursday night
was part of a swarm that has been hitting the area since Monday,
scientists say.
The quake was centered near West Yellowstone, but was also felt by people in Gardiner and Bozeman.
“As
of 10 a.m. this morning we had located a total of 235 earthquakes in
the area,” said Jamie Farrell, University of Utah research professor of
seismology.
Yellowstone
gets about 1,500 to 2,000 earthquakes every year. About half of those
come in earthquake swarms — lots of earthquakes in a small area in a
short amount of time.
So this activity is fairly normal, Farrell said.
Most
of the earthquakes in this swarm have been small — only four above
magnitude 3. Thursday’s 4.5 magnitude earthquake was the only one
reported to the U.S. Geological Survey website, meaning people actually
felt it.
Not only was
Thursday’s quake the largest in the current swarm, it was the largest in
the area since March 30, 2014, when a 4.8 magnitude earthquake hit near
Norris Geyser Basin, according to a news release from the University of
Utah Seismograph Station.
Farrell
said the swarm is the effect of normal tectonic stress in the Earth’s
crust. As of Friday morning, his the University of Utah seismologists
weren’t seeing anything volcanic in nature. Yellowstone National Park is
home to a large volcano and the site of the largest and most diverse
collection of natural thermal features in the world.
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