August 22, 2005... 3 days from #Katrina' s landfall in southeast FL as a Category 1 hurricane and 7 days away from its final landfall in eastern LA as a Category 3 hurricane. Here's a wind swath generated from a parametric model I coded up. Wind speed reduction over land is a generous 30%. [1/2]

The track history with some selected satellite images are shown here. [2/2]

Much of this week's Science in Action is taken up with the Mw8.8 earthquake in Kamchatka and the tsunami that followed. www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/w...

8. The Aegean slab is the oldest piece of subducting oceanic lithosphere on Earth and has just a single plain of Wadati-Benioff Zone seismicity. Models for single vs double plains of seismicity don't think about that enough--can't be a function of age/temperature.

4. For reliable/robust features, nothing we know about the Farallon slab has really changed since Steve Grand's late 90s paper. The parts that later models agree on tend to be identical to his model.

⚒️🧪Pleased to be cited in this National Geographic article about the earthquake and tsunami risks in the northwest Pacific by @squigglyvolcano.bsky.social #seismology #earthquakes #sciencecommunication

Fresh from the press, so to speak, a result of our #tsunami model based on the specifics of this earthquake (we will update it one we have more model runs). The color code is wave height in metres. The dotted line in the centre of the picture is the Hawaiian island chain.

NEW: A magnitude 8.8 megaquake blasted tsunami waves across the Pacific today. Here's everything you need to know about it, including: -Why it happened -Why it generated a widespread tsunami -Why the timing of this megaquake is a bit weird Me, for NatGeo www.nationalgeographic.com/science/arti...

NEW: You may wonder why Japan’s 2011 mag-9.1 quake created a colossal tsunami that killed 18,000 people, while today’s mag-8.8 quake made a big, but not catastrophic, tsunami. For @sciam.bsky.social, I explore why. (Hint: it’s because the 2011 quake was SO much stronger.)

Magnitude 8.7 #earthquake in Kamchatka, following a M7.4 last week - may be largest earthquake since 2011, 8th largest on record globally, #tsunami warning in place for US west coast and Canada - the historic 1952 M9 closely caused a destructive tsunami across the Pacific

Putting on my "general geohazards communicator" hat here for a moment: In all but the *very* most extreme earthquake-generated tsunami events, locations more than ~100ft above sea level are generally safe. In vast majority of such events, "vertical evacuation" is the way to go!

Magnitude : 5.2 Region: *Near East Coast of Kamchatka* Time: 2025-07-30 05:51:51 UTC Epicenter : 158.92°E 51.97°N Depth: 30 km *First posted at: 06:03 UTC* https://geofon.gfz-potsdam.de/eqexplorer/events/gfz2025oudg/general ##GEOFON ##GFZ ##earthquake ##magnitude

The M7.1 Ridgecrest earthquake struck California 6 years ago this weekend. At the time it was the largest earthquake in the area for 20 years. Events like this provide an opportunity to learn from the earth, and to share that research with the world in journals like Seismica.

⚒️ Article: Ruptures on more structurally mature faults are more localized and therefore expected to host faster ruptures with less off-fault deformation @quakes-from-space.bsky.social www.nature.com/articles/s41...

First paroxysmal eruptive episode at #Etna's Southeast Crater since 18 months, on the morning of 2 June 2025. Collapse of the northeast flank of the crater generated a spectacular (but harmless) pyroclastic flow down the upper side of the mountain. (1/2)

Two features that clearly demonstrate the on-fault displacement field surrounding rupture propagation are the plant next to the wall on the left and the gate itself. Since rarely do seismic stations located so close to the fault (meters away!), these features offer unprecedented observations: 🧵⚒️🧪

#FridayFold (Probably) Cretaceous carbonates tightly folded to a recumbent fold. Honestly I have no idea of what created this fold, aside from that being is an area of left-right extension and normal faulting. Really puzzling. On the Nuweiba-Taba road, Sinai peninsula

Published!!!! The first article of my PhD and the first from the lab that I set up!! 🤩🤩 We study the dynamic effects of fault bends on earthquake ruptures by imaging shear ruptures in PMMA plates propagating through bends (double bends to be exact). www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/... ⚒️🧪

For more context on today’s M6.2 #earthquake in the Sea of Marmara, a figure from Bohnhoff et al. (2013) shows the major North Anatolian Fault Zone segments with potential future rupture scenarios and their associated magnitudes. Today’s quake is located near the center of the Marmara segment. ⚒️🧪

This not going to end well.....

M5.2 outside of Julian. Did you feel it? Report it! There will be felt aftershocks. If you feel earthquake, shaking drop down to the ground, take cover underneath the sturdy object and hold on until the shaking has stopped. earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/...

Map of today’s M5.2 #earthquake near Julian in the context of regional past seismicity. This event was located near the Elsinore fault and relatively deep at 18 km. 🧪⚒️

Xavier Le Pichon, a pioneer in early plate tectonics research died on 22 March. Pichon developed the first global reconstruction of Earth's tectonic plates. eos.org/articles/pod...

"we explain the ”unusual” waveform signature of the Myanmar earthquake by a multiple, asymmetric bilateral rupture, involving boomerang-like back-rupture propagation and supershear." Preprint by Inoue, et al. about the Myanmar quake eartharxiv.org/repository/v... ⚒️🧪

Myanmar's terrible earthquake brings back old memories of fieldwork over there... a long time ago. We learned that the rupture could have been extremely long (~500 km), very fast (supershear?) and that ground liquefaction could have worsened the local effects. What else could have gone even worse?

En 2000 nous avions réalisé un profil cinématique avec un GPS de haute précision (centimétrique) sur la voie ferrée depuis Pyin Oo Lwyin jusqu'à Monywa en passant par Mandalay et Sagaing. si on pouvait le reproduire on verrait le rebond élastique de la croute terrestre généré par le séisme du 28/03

Many geophysicists have similar stories to tell. Mine involves a geyser and a gravimeter… ⚒️🧪🌋 www.instagram.com/stories/h0rd...

Forgot to tag ⚒️ 🧪 I take the opportunity to mention that ~3.2m is the offset localised on the visible fault rupture. It is possible that a proportion of more diffuse deformation must be added on both sides. This remains to be measured.

Huge congratulations to my long-term friend and colleague Ahmed Elbanna @mcslabuiuc.bsky.social on becoming the next Director of SCEC! Super excited to be part of the next chapter of SCEC with Ahmed’s leadership, expertise, and deep passion for earthquake science www.scec.org?mailpoet_rou...

This is cool. The Guardian recreated a searchable climate future risk tool (wildfire, extreme heat, drought, hurricane, and coastal flood) for the US that was developed by FEMA but deleted by the Trump administration’s ‘climate’ purge.

Preliminary back-projection which seems to confirm the finite fault model: www.linkedin.com/posts/hongju...

The latest models from the USGS show slip, and associated strong shaking, extending much further to the south. Here I have plotted contours of estimated shaking over a map of population density. Note that the fault runs south through a narrow valley that is densely populated. ⚒️ 🧪 Myanmar earthquake

I often use that image from Eric Dunham's website to show the difference between sub shear and supershear rupture pangea.stanford.edu/~edunham/res...

When the fault breaks underground, it often breaks at the speed less than S-wave (or shear wave) speed. This case is referred to as sub-shear rupture. However, if certain physical conditions are met, fault can break at the speed higher than S-wave speed. Such cases are called super-shear rupture.

[2/3] La magnitude mesurée selon l’échelle de moment (Mw) dépend de la surface rompue, du déplacement et de la résistance des roches. L’échelle est logarithmique : un séisme de magnitude 7 génère 10× + de secousses qu’un de magnitude 6, et libère 32× plus d’énergie. #geography #earthquake #Myanmar

Preliminary analysis of strong motion sensors supports a long supershear rupture propagation www.linkedin.com/posts/zhe-ji...

This is a pretty good article covering the structural aspects. My only addition would be that while flat slab construction is not the ideal system for seismic resistance, there is no reason it can't be used safely if properly designed. www.bbc.com/news/article...

Rock Identification xkcd.com/3068

EERI, through their Learning from Earthquakes Program, made a web page which collects news outlets and scientific resources about the Myanmar earthquake eeri.org/about-eeri/n...

NEW: A catastrophic magnitude 7.7 earthquake shook Southeast Asia today, devastating entire neighbourhoods in cities throughout Myanmar—and the damage even extended as far as Thailand. What caused it? Why was it so powerful? Me for @sciam.bsky.social www.scientificamerican.com/article/what...

New USGS finite fault solution is intriguing. Bilateral rupture: northward rupture extending to the 2012 M6.8 rupture; southern rupture involving entire Meiktila segment. Areas of high slip (5-6m), with a lower slip (2-3m) area correlating with Mw 6.7 aftershock: earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/...

USGS updated PAGER estimate. It's frightening. Zone of extreme damage is now shown elongated along Sagaing fault for >500km. 70% probability of fatalities > 10000 (~35% >100000). ⚒️ 🧪 These are probabilities, hopefully overestimated. In any case it's a massive disaster. Thoughts for the victims 💔

This video shows a bit more than the others I've seen - the right hand side starts to collapse first, and drags the adjacent columns down, pulling the left-hand side of the tower over. Looks like failure was at the right-hand lower levels. Could indeed be foundations or a soft storey on that side.

Can't tell from the videos why it collapsed - but the fact it was under construction should not have made any difference. The structural frame was substantially complete. This is either a design fault or poor construction (or both).

Actual structural engineer's comments on the Bangkok building collapse.

I am still in shock at the image of the falling building in Bangkok, it seems way to far. Any help from the earthquake engineering folks? Is it because of the soft story? The fact was in was under construction ? Local site effects? #earthquakeengineering

Update: The USGS has made a notable update to its ShakeMap. Now showing a substantially larger rupture that suggests major impacts for an even bigger portion of Myanmar. 3.71 million people now estimated to have felt Violent (MMI: IX) shaking. That is hugely concerning. Strong aftershocks persist.