Someone has probably asked this question before, but I conducted a search with due diligence and could not find mention of it, so:
Say all of the major active faults on earth suffer massive earthquakes simultaneously, or in the most destructive sequence, if there is such a thing. What places would emerge unscathed, or relatively so? (i.e., too far from the coast to break off into the ocean or be flooded, no volcanos nearby, not liable to be subsumed, no nuclear facilities close by, etc.)
Anywhere far away from a plate boundary, and in a location far enough inland to be unaffected by tsunamis.
It’s not quite that simple, because you can get meaningful seismic activity even in places nowhere near a plate boundary. This map shows the most hazardous places in the world for seismic activity; anywhere that’s shown white on that map, and not in danger of a tsunami, is in the clear. The Sahara desert, the Amazon rainforest and Florida are all decent places to hang out in an apocalyptic earthquake attack, for instance.
That link isn’t working for me. I was under the impression that major seismic activity far from plate boundaries was very rare (though not unheard of, deep zone earthquakes can occur anywhere). What am I missing?
New Madrid blows your theory out the window.
As well as Greenland, Central and Northern Canada and Siberia.
BRRRRRRRRRR
Seems that I’m not wrong, intraplate quakes are very rare. But yes, there are some areas inside a plate you want to avoid such as New Madrid, where an underlying fault has weakened the crust.
Reading up a bit more on the subject, you’d also want to avoid Wadati-Benioff zones. These are poorly understood deep earthquakes at some subduction zones, where one plate slides under another. Because of the depth and angle at which the plate is subducting, the earthquakes can occur some distance from the actual plate boundary.
Just for fun here is the USGS world earthquake map showing that all the major faults are in fact quaking pretty much all the time, though usually not in a devastating way. Check out New Zealand!
Yep – they are not called the Shaky Isles for nothing.
This link shows the activity in Christchurch over the last few days. As I understand it there have been only two days without a significant earthquake in Christchurch since September 4 2010. And of course there was the aftershock just over a year ago that killed 180 and destroyed much of the city.
This link shows the last 30 earthquakes in the country. I am used to seeing this page span 30-40 days. However, it is taking things a while to settle down in Christchurch. Some times I have looked and there have only been two days for those 30.
ETA - looks like four days in the last eighteen months without quakes in Christchurch. Check out Feb 21 and 24!
