One of the strongest in history was the Oklahoma earthquake on September 3, 2016. The magnitude of seismic shocks was 5.6 points. The US Geological Survey recorded an earthquake in Oklahoma. However, the public failed to timely warn about this. What led to such serious seismic activity? What are the consequences of the Oklahoma earthquake?
What happened in Oklahoma?
On the morning of September 3, 2016, at around 7 a.m., strong tremors were recorded in Oklahoma . The epicenter of the phenomenon was a territory 14 km from the city of Pawnee, which is the administrative center of the district. According to the researchers, the seismic activity center was formed at a depth of 6.6 km.
It is worth noting that there was an earthquake in Oklahoma and other states. Tremors of varying strength were recorded throughout the Midwest of the country, particularly in Kansas, Missouri, Iowa, Nebraska, Texas and Arkansas.
The seismic activity in question has become the strongest in the United States since November 2011. The Oklahoma earthquake lasted for just over a minute. However, this was much longer than any known seismic activity that was recorded in the region before.
Effects
What did unexpected seismic activity in the USA lead to? The Oklahoma earthquake did not cause catastrophic damage. As a result of the incident, only a few residential buildings in the city of Pawnee were damaged. In the remaining nearby settlements, the buildings remained intact.
The Oklahoma earthquake caused one person to be injured. The latter was taken to a hospital in Pawnee with injuries of varying severity that did not carry a life threat.
The main alarm was caused by the rather close location of the epicenter of seismic activity to a nuclear power plant in the neighboring state of Nebraska. Despite the strong, unexpected underground rumors, the employees of the nuclear power plant managed to take timely actions aimed at preventing a man-made disaster.
The causes of the earthquake
In 2015, the United States National Geological Survey already warned of a possible earthquake in Oklahoma. The institution’s specialists conducted research, the results of which confirmed the relationship between the active mining of minerals in the region (oil, gas), the injection of wastewater into the ground and increased seismic activity.
Modern technologies for the extraction of hydrocarbons from deep soil layers suggest the injection of working fluids into injection wells at significant speeds. All this happens under great pressure. The implementation of these technological solutions allowed us to produce a real shale revolution in the United States.
In total, the team of the National Geological Survey managed to analyze the activity of 180 thousand injection wells. About 10% of them were located in Oklahoma, where the strongest earthquake was recorded. Scientists noted that the use of technologies for intensive hydrocarbon production from beneath the earth's crust is fraught with the emergence of large seismic shocks.
Actions of the authorities
After the earthquake, Oklahoma Governor Mary Fellin announced the introduction of an emergency regime in the county. Within 30 days from the occurrence of tremors, the consequences of the disaster should have been urgently eliminated.
Governor Fellin also ordered an urgent campaign to close mines and wells for storing wastewater. Presumably, it was the spent liquids that were used during the active extraction of gas and oil from the Earth's interior that provoked increased seismic activity in the region.
In total, 37 industrial wells were mothballed, which were actively exploited by gas workers and oil workers. Such radical decisions were implemented in Oklahoma, despite the fact that the state economy is largely dependent on the energy sector, which provides jobs for 25% of the county’s population.