Almost Half of All Americans At Risk From Damaging Earthquakes, USGS Study

The U.S. Geological Survey is reporting a 3.3-magnitude quake off the coast of San Francisco on Sunday afternoon. Lump in Alaska, Hawaii, and the U.S. territories, and the count equals nearly half the country’s population.

When looking at the highest populations exposed to the strongest shaking California leads the way followed by Washington, Utah, Tennessee, Oregon, South Carolina, Nevada, Arkansas, Missouri and Illinois.

It’s not just people who live near the San Andreas fault that need to be anxious about devastating earthquakes.

Two people in Columbia were among those submitting information about their quake experiences over the weekend.

“The new exposure estimate is almost double the previous 2006 estimate of 75 million Americans in 39 states, and is attributed to both population growth and advances in science”, William Leith, USGS senior science advisor for natural disaster and geologic hazards and a co-author of the study, told the USGS. This time-frame is considered affordable for life-safety issues when designing buildings and different buildings. “There are places in the United States where we think ground shaking could be significant and we ought to look at those areas to see if they are built to the safe levels that would correspond to these ground shaking levels.” “Of specific concern is the numerous quantity of crucial infrastructure situated in excessive earthquake-hazard areas, starting from personal and public faculties to well being care amenities and hearth stations”.

The research team analyzed the risk of earthquakes within a 50-year timeframe.

USGS scientists are now researching ways to understand potential ground shaking from induced earthquakes and incorporate that knowledge in U.S. National Seismic Hazard Maps.