The Mississippi River Causing Earthquakes?

The Mississippi River has been thought to play a role in the 1811-1812 earthquake in the New Madrid Seismic Zone, an area of possible turbulence where no earthquakes are supposed to be found. However, in December 1811, a pair of massive magnitude 7.2+ temblors slashed through the Mississippi River Valley near the corners of Missouri, Kentucky, Arkansas, Tennessee, and Illinois. Two more sturdy earthquakes swifted through the beginning of 1812 and resulted in many damages. A new paper in the journal Nature implies that the river's erosive action can be blamed for. Between 16,000 and 10,000 years ago, as North America came out from the last ice age, the Mississippi and Ohio Rivers united to eliminate 12 meters of sediment from a large swath in the New Madrid region. Researchers think that Earth's crust relaxed slowly under the lightened load. Ancient, buried faults that had been packed together and locked tight began edging closer toward disastrous breakdown and then they suddenly broke. Strong earthquakes take place solely where tectonic plates are crushing past one another. New Madrid is in the middle of the North America plate, which has been stable for tens of millions of years. New Madrid has not moved, which is a good thing.

This source explains science concepts because it talks about earthquakes, tectonic plates, and a little bit about how the Mississippi River eroded sediment from a big swath. Earthquakes can cause severe damages to a lot of places that are next to the actual site of the earthquake. This article also deals with the “faults zones” which is probably something that is bad in a certain area.

We should be informed about this issue because some earthquakes are very destructive than others. We should know this in order to save our lives and to know what to do to get ready when it comes. For example, an earthquake from Middle America can be felt all the way to Maine, as the report has told us. This new will urges us to study more about the Mississippi River and to follow its action because it may play more roles in more earthquakes in the future.

http://news.discovery.com/earth/how-the-mississippi-river-triggers-earthquakes.html