30/6/11 - 6 Strange Anomalies With The Virginia Earthquake

USGS Shakemap Image

Eric Blair
Activist Post

My first thought upon hearing the news of the rare 5.9 magnitude earthquake in Virginia this week was that it was not a natural occurrence. After all, no one has ever felt or even heard of such a powerful temblor happening in this area in a lifetime. As is usual for my cynical instincts, I hoped that I was wrong. However, several anomalies indicate that something is not normal with the Virginia quake.

First, I spend a lot of time in the "Ring of Fire" zone and have experienced numerous earthquakes.  By no means does this make me an expert, nor scientifically qualified to analyze earthquakes.  But, as enthusiasts, we looked up every quake we felt over a five-year period -- the size, epicenter location, depth, and so on, to get a general sense of placing how it "felt" relative to the official data.

I can categorically state that, of the dozen or so earthquakes that I've experienced, including a powerful 6.2, all of them started gently, none of them were over 50 miles away, all of them had depths of several kilometers, and the big ones seemed to have multiple aftershocks reported. Again, I say this as an observer, not as a scientist, and I'm only providing this background simply to qualify my immediate skepticism.

Furthermore, curiously, the "Great Virginia Quake of 2011," unprecedented in size and scope, should have grabbed the media headlines and discussion for weeks, but Hurricane Irene has all but wiped the earthquake off the weather map.  Even as all the storm measurements for Irene show that it will likely be a minor nuisance, maybe some flooding and power outages, multiple states of emergency have been declared, mandatory mass evacuations ordered, and the media is all too eager to spread the panic.  You'd think the east coast of the United States was being invaded.  It feels like a distraction, or perhaps a large but manageable live drill of some kind to make heroes out of our politicians, and FEMA look like a successful agency.

If this manic and surreal coverage of Irene is a deliberate distraction, the anomalies regarding the recent earthquake may have provided sufficient motivation for doing so.  Not to discount other establishment catastrophes that they may want to distract from at this critical time -- like the crumbling economy, record political disapproval, and the bungled invasion of Tripoli -- but, if any discussion about the unusual nature of the earthquake was allowed one must ponder if some sort of manipulation was involved.  The establishment will not permit such talk, apparently; hence the rapid about-face on earthquake coverage.

Below are six abnormalities about the Virginia earthquake that should warrant further investigation:

Location: The location is the most obvious anomaly for such a powerful quake. Although the area of the U.S. where the earthquake initiated sits on the edge of an ancient tectonic plate called the Craton Plate, it is considered a relatively dormant or settled area.  In other words, it's not a very active earthquake zone.  Therefore, any noticeable earthquake is unusual, let alone a 5.9 monster that was reportedly felt 500 miles away. Furthermore, if one is inclined to believe that earthquakes can be manipulated, the epicenter occurring close to Washington D.C. (with all its sensitive military and government infrastructure) raises some suspicions. Admittedly, that's conjecture, but considering the following oddities it might be more believable by the end of the article.

Unusually Shallow Depth:  The initial hypocenter (depth) of the quake reported by the establishment media was, wait for it, wait for it, only 0.1 miles or about 528 feet (161 meters) deep. That's right, AFP announced the depth with certainty, "The Pentagon, the US Capitol and monuments in the nation's capital were all evacuated after the 5.9-magnitude quake, which was shallow with its epicenter only 0.1 miles underground."  The depth was later adjusted to a more believable 3.7 miles (5.95 kilometers) beneath the surface. Still, shallow-focus quakes usually only occur in areas abundant in seismic activity, like the ring of fire. And the depths of those shallow-focus earthquakes are usually in the tens of kilometers deep.  The Earth's crust in the Eastern U.S. where "the fault lines are more healed" is described by CBS News as "older and colder" than out West. Which, according to Wikipedia, means it should have been a deep-focus earthquake with a depth ranging from 300 to 700 kilometers.  Certainly not one barely below the Earth's surface.

Odd Seismograph Reading:  A reporter from Press Core received an anonymous email from someone claiming to be in the U.S. Air Force that stated the Virginia earthquake “wasn’t a natural earthquake and not a HAARP earthquake."  The reporter was instructed to find a seismograph of the Washington DC area earthquake and compare it to a past earthquakes and seismic readings of the alleged underground nuclear test by North Korea that resulted in a 4.7 magnitude tremor at a depth of zero.

Seismograph of Virginia quake in green -- Washington and Lee University (85 miles from epicenter)

Press Core writes, the green lines indicate the blunt tremor that was felt in Washington D.C. and the black lines are a transparent overlay of a seismograph from a pdf file from Virginia Division Mineral Resources on Earthquakes. That file describes a typical natural occurring earthquake as:

When a fault ruptures, energy is released in the form of seismic waves. The first waves to reach the earth’s surface are primary or 'P' waves (Figure 2). P waves are compressional waves that travel at a speed of about four miles per second near the surface – faster as depth increases. The next waves to reach the earth’s surface are secondary or 'S' waves. S waves are shear waves that move at a speed of about 1.5 miles per second. P and S waves are body waves that travel through the earth much like sonar waves travel through water. Surface waves, which are slower than S waves, travel along the surface of the earth much like waves at the surface of the ocean. S waves and surface waves cause the most destruction at the earth’s surface.

The article concludes; "What is missing from the seismograph for the Washington DC area 5.8 magnitude earthquake are the primary or 'P' waves. All earthquakes that are the direct result of fault rupture have these primary or 'P' waves. Nuclear detonations do not."

Distance Felt: As my introduction stated, I've never "felt" an earthquake whose epicenter was farther than 50 miles away.  Of course, this doesn't mean that it's not possible, as clearly this was felt upwards of 500 miles from the epicenter.  The CBS article quoted above that referred to the crust as "older and colder" also uses that argument to explain why tremors were felt so far away: "The East is far less seismically active -- but when earthquakes do hit, that hard ground is far more effective at conducting the seismic waves. When you hit it, it rings like a bell," said Christopher Scholz a professor of geophysics at Columbia University's Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory at Columbia University."  This seems a bit contradictory given the shallow depth of the quake, but there may be some validity to the "bell" theory.  The fact remains, earthquakes whose effects travel long distances are uncommon, hence the reason for the CBS article about why the quake was so "widely felt."

'Remarkably Low' Number of Aftershocks:  Amy Vaughan, a geophysicist with the USGS Earthquake Information Center in Colorado told CBS News that "For the size earthquake that occurred, I think the number of aftershocks so far has been remarkably low." Don Blakeman, another geophysicist at the Earthquake Information Center, added "Typically, the larger the quake, the longer and the greater extent of aftershocks. Shallow earthquakes like the one in Virginia also tend to generate numerous aftershocks."  The lack of aftershocks led the USGS to report that the Virginia quake may be just a foreshock of something larger to come. A foreshock is an earthquake that occurs before a larger seismic event (the mainshock) and is related to it in both time and space.  I'm not sure what this means other than it's just another abnormality about this quake.

Image source - Enterprise Mission

Instantaneously Knocked Irene Off Course: Kevin Hayden and Glenn Kreisberg reported"Coincidentally, the time frame leading up to Virginia/DC/New York area experiencing freak seismic activity, Hurricane Irene begins to weaken and move off course, avoiding its initial path of Havanna, inland Florida, the Carolinas, and eventually, the Washington, DC area. The newly projected paths show that it may barely clip the eastern coast, if at all. Just as Ophelia did when it threatened the same region."  Irene stalled and changed directions similar to Ophelia seen in the graphic provided.  Clearly, these types of drastic changes are not a natural path for hurricanes.

A few articles have speculated that HAARP earthquake weapons were to blame, in conjunction with manipulating hurricane Irene. Indeed, when one knows even the basic capabilities of HAARP, this does not seem too far-fetched.  Press Core seems to think the seismic data proves it was more similar to an underground nuclear detonation.  One thing is for sure, the mysterious characteristics of the Virginia quake seem to indicate that it was not a typical earthquake.