Residents in Snyder, Texas got rocked and rolled yesterday, when they experienced a 4.4 magnitude earthquake, the strongest yet in a series of recent earthquake activity.
The preliminary magnitude 4.4 quake happened around 7:30 a.m. Sunday about 11 miles north-northeast of Snyder in Scurry County, but was felt by people as far away as Lubbock 77 miles to the north and through much of East Texas and Louisiana, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.
As I noted in my previous posting about the earthquakes in Snyder, they are covered up with drilling. If you click on that previous posting you can see a love letter from industry.
UPDATE: From the comments, they had a 3.7 this morning.
UPDATE 2: And I just want to add something here: If you think a 4.4 earthquake did no damage, think again. Let’s see what happens to foundations of homes in a few weeks or months. Let’s be sure to watch all those pipelines in the ground. What about the drill pipe and the casing that is supposed to protect our water from contamination?
About Sharon Wilson
Sharon Wilson is considered a leading citizen expert on the impacts of shale oil and gas extraction. She is the go-to person whether it’s top EPA officials from D.C., national and international news networks, or residents facing the shock of eminent domain and the devastating environmental effects of natural gas development in their backyards.
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This morning’s (9/12/11) quake:
http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/recenteqsus/Quakes/us2011qta9.php
I lived in Midland, Texas for 14 years. Lots of drilling and stuff. I left in 1989 and have recently been back in the area for personal & business reason. I left Midland and travel up to Dallas on Int. 20 and noticed all of the windfarm in the area.
Maybe the windfarms had something to do with the earthquake.
Have a nice day!
Now, stex, you know the windmills didn’t cause any earthquakes.
Maybe if some farmers would intersperse a few windmills on their farms, we wouldn’t have to give them all those disaster and commodity subsidies. Think?
Yes, the windmills are knocking so many birds out of the sky that when they hit the ground it produces an earthquake like tremor. Also due to the death of so many birds of prey the Urinarian mole has thrived. It is the largest of the mole species and digs a hole under the ground so immense that a large bear could wander for days in search oh honeycombs left by the cavern bee in the caverns left behind. These caverns can also contribute to recent seismic activity. It is just terrible.
Waste brine injection for enhanced oil recovery was a factor in the seismic slip that caused the Baldwin Hills CA Dam failure in 1963:
http://www.stanford.edu/~meehan/la/baldwin.htm
Injection induced earthquake References:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/08/24/1010130/-I-Experienced-a-Man-Made-Quake-in-1967-Caused-by-Fluid-Injection-in-a-Well
The quakes are being caused by a
change in stress that occurs in the
fault lines. These fault lines are a
prime target for frac activity. Due
to the extraction of oil/gas and lack
of replacement, the result is plate
shifting. The earthquakes are usually
minor, depending on the amount of
drilling activity in the area. Snyder, TX
has tons of holes punched through it.
I’m surprised the town is still standing.
There’s a map of this quake and the aftershocks at http://earthquaketrack.com/quakes/2011-09-11-12-27-45-utc-4-3-10
here is a little more on earthquakes going back 36 years for Snyder.
http://earthquaketrack.com/us-tx-snyder/recent?before=2006-08-12+10%3A49%3A09+UTC