5 Ways to Cause a Man Made earthquake

Since the recent earthquake in Haiti, the forum has been abuzz with claims that it was created by man, more specifically created by HAARP. Despite the fact that the HAARP arrays point straight up in the air and that the amount of power available is that of a very small power station (not very much), the theory continues to hang around like a bad smell.

So I thought I would present some other theories of man made earthquakes, theories with a little more fact to back them up.

Most of the article is citing information from Dr Christian Klose, who is a geohazards researcher at Columbia’s Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory.

He's written several peer reviewed papers on the subject which you can find here.

Please note that some of these theories are under dispute, which I hope will spawn some healthy debate here and I would love to hear from anyone better versed on the subject.

Build a Dam
Water is heavier than air, so when the valley behind a dam is filled, the crust underneath the water experiences a massive change in stress load. For example, the Hoover Dam area experienced hundreds of quakes as Lake Mead filled. University of Alaska seismologist Larry Gedney explained, "Since [the dam] reached its peak of 475 feet in 1939, the level of seismicity has fluctuated in direct response to water level. None of the shocks has been particularly damaging — the largest was about magnitude 5 — but the area had no record of being seismically active." Other examples of dam-caused quakes abound and Klose’s research indicates that about one-third of human-caused earthquakes came from reservoir construction. This science has raised fears that the recent earthquake in China was caused by the filling of the Three Gorges Dam reservoir, although no conclusive evidence has been presented.

Inject Liquid Into the Ground
In 1961, the Army decided that the best way to dispose of toxic waste from napalm production (among other things) was to drill a 12,000-foot-deep well in the Rocky Mountains and inject the bad stuff down it into the crust of the Earth. From 1962 to 1966, the Army deposited 165 million gallons of toxic waste into this hole in the Earth. Unfortunately, the injections probably triggered earthquakes in the region, and the Army shut the operation down. As seismologist Dave Wolny explained, "If you are doing deep well injection, you are altering the stress on the underlying rocks and at some point, the stress will be relieved by generating an earthquake."

Columbia’s Klose fears that carbon dioxide sequestration, in which compressed CO2 captured from coal plants would be injected into underground deposits, could generate earthquakes too, and worse they’ll be near heavily populated regions. "Unfortunately, coal-fired power plants are closer to cities," said Klose.

Mine a Lot of Coal
Coal provides more than half the electricity in the United States and an even greater percentage in China. That means there are a lot of coal mines working overtime to pull the fossilized fuel out of the Earth. In total, miners pulled 6,195 million metric tons of coal out of the Earth in 2006 alone. And coal mines often have to pump water out along with the coal, sometimes extracting dozens of times as much water as coal. Add it up and you have a huge change in the mass of a region, and huge mass changes refigure the earthquake stresses of an area, sometimes increasing the chance of an earthquake and other times lowering it. Klose’s work suggests that more than 50 percent of the human-triggered earthquakes recorded came from mining operations.

Drill a Gusher Dry
Three of the largest human-caused quakes occurred near a natural-gas field in Uzbekistan, the Gazli. The combination of liquid extraction and injection changed the tectonic action in the field. The biggest of the trio registered as a 7.3. According to a major analysis by Russian scientists, "Few will deny that there is a relationship between hydrocarbon recovery and seismic activity, but exactly how strong a relationship exists has yet to be determined." They caution that in regions where tectonic activity is already high, extracting oil and natural gas could trigger strong quakes.

Create the World’s Biggest Building
Back in 2005, a geologist claimed that the world’s then-tallest building, the Taipei 101, which weighs in at more than 700,000 metric tons, was triggering earthquakes in a long-dormant fault in Taiwan. Klose doubts that the building actually did so, but said that it wasn’t outside the realm of possibility for a building to create an earthquake. The weight of the building, however, would have to be much greater than the Taipei 101’s, and even much larger than the Burj Dubai, currently still under construction but already the world’s tallest building.

www.wired.com...

[edit on 29/1/10 by Chadwickus]

great post!!
i only us2 think that Tesla's technology could cause a man made one.
i never even considerd these factors
thanks!!!!

Yep good post

I remember reading that the big quake in China sometime back could of been triggered by the irresponsible draining of a big reservoir that was on a fault line area - the release of all the weight was the final straw and boom, quake and the mud slides.

reply to post by Now_Then


It makes sense doesn't it, the weight has to be displaced somewhere.

As Newton said; To every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.

There's another Chad

Build a Geothermal Energy project

And related to this:

Swiss court acquit scienist accused of causing earthquakes

reply to post by Chadwickus


That's right, but in that case the reaction was vastly more energenitic than the man made input of course... Monkeys with spanners we are sometimes!

But yes, everything always has to = 100% somehow, some where and sooner or later, just try not to be there when it happens all of a sudden!

reply to post by Essan


Ah yes geothermal energy.

I've heard briefly of this incident.

It's a damn shame really because I really, really like(d?) the theory of geothermal energy.

There's talk of using this here in Australia, perhaps we'll have a little more luck here since there aren't any active fault line to deal with.

Except the one down near Tasmania/Victoria

I believe HAARPs power can be reflected and bounced to reach anywhere on the planet.

[edit on 29-1-2010 by SeeingBlue]

Originally posted by Chadwickus
I've heard briefly of this incident.

It's a damn shame really because I really, really like(d?) the theory of geothermal energy.

Me too. I always thought it was the obvious 'green' and effectively limitless energy source. Seems more work is needed - though of course in places like Iceland where no deep drilling is needed it works rather well!

Unlike HAARP they all seem very plausible possible earthquake causes to me and for some of them I have already read some verified stories in the past.

S&F!

I can't cite any references at the moment, but the reason why some ppl think that a facility like HAARP can cause earthquakes, alter weather etc...is due to a property of combining EM signals in different ways. One word that used to be used was 'tele-geodynamics'. I remember reading, although I dont know where, in one of Tesla's statements that using radio waves/frequencies he could change weather, cause earthquakes, and even evaporate enemies at a distance of around 200 miles (this was right after WW1 and was part of his pitch to the US gov to license/use his technology).

When frequences of certain amplitudes are interfered in certain ways, certain effects can be created...some with disasterous consequences. Tom Bearden is one individual who has spoken/written a great deal on actually how this stuff works.

My personal opinion, for what its worth, is that most ppl have a certain frame of reference in their lives that can only tolerate things they are able to imagine or grasp in some way, usually based on their personal experiences and understanding of how things work and COULD work under certain circumstances. There is also the issue of a persons 'world view'...how they understand things to work. Then theres also what we WANT to believe about life/world/reality....and often even very convincing evidence can be presented to someone who for some reason or another doesn't want to believe, or can't believe because its beyond their frame of reference.

I have heard ppl many times say they are open minded, but it usually doesnt take very long to find out what they are not open minded about.

Tesla is in so many ways responsible for pioneering, researching and experimenting with the foundational principles and operations and applications of things that have made our modern world possible....and I find it odd and in some ways sad that when he who is largely credited with all these things, makes what many ppl would consider an outlandish statement, all his accomplishments and the unimpeachable credentials he has fall by the way side.

Having said all that....I have no doubt that just like the OP has enumerated...there are plenty of more 'pedestrian' or easy to swallow explanations responsible for many catastrophes we read about.

Here's an abstract from a paper that Dr .Christian Klose wrote about the M5.6 earthquake that ocurred in Newcaste, NSW in 1989.

As most know, Australia is largely dormant when it comes to earthquakes but there are several fault lines running through the continent.

Inherent to black-coal mining in New South Wales (Australia) since 1801, the discharge of ground water may have triggered the M5.6 Newcastle earthquake in 1989. 4-dimensional geomechanical model simulations reveal that widespread water removal and coal as deep as a 500 m depth resulted in an unload of the Earth's crust. This unload caused a destabilization process of the pre-existing Newcastle fault in the interior of the crust beneath the Newcastle coal field. In tandem, an increase in shear stress and a decrease in normal stress may have reactivated this reverse fault. Over the course of the last fifty years, elevated levels of lithostatic stress alterations have accelerated. In 1991, based on the modeling of the crust's elastostatic response to the unload, there has been the minimal critical shear stress changes of 0.01 Mega Pascal (0.1 bar) that reached the Newcastle fault at a depth where the 1989 mainshock nucleated. Hence, it can be anticipated that other faults might also be critically stressed in that region for a couple of reasons. First, the size of the area (volume) that is affected by the induced stress changes is larger than the ruptured area of the Newcastle fault. Second, the seismic moment magnitude of the 1989 M5.6 Newcastle earthquake is associated with only a fraction of mass removal (1 of 55), following McGarr's mass-moment relationship. Lastly, these findings confirm ongoing seismicity in the Newcastle region since the beginning of the 19th century after a dormant period of 10,000 years of no seismicity.

reply to post by Chadwickus
The collected weight of jaws hitting the ground from the witlessness of HAARP fantasists could cause a minor tremor.

It's an interesting thread. I'd never thought about artificially caused quakes before. Although Haiti hasn't been caused by anything other than natural forces, I wonder how many dense population centers have been affected over the centuries? I guess the weight of cities would be a gradual development that the Earth's plates and faults would 'ease into' (technical terminology 101). Still, it's possibly had an effect somewhere down the line.

Giza has experienced earthquakes in the centuries BC. It's made me wonder if the removal of 6 million tons of stone from one place and putting it all somewhere else (Great Pyramid) could have been responsible?

reply to post by Kandinsky


No I don't believe the Haiti quake was anything more than a natural event either.

It amazes me just how much influence we actually have on this planet.

Cheap bump.

I would love to hear more thoughts on this subject.

Good, bad, otherwise.

Explanation: S&F! [a while ago]

Personal Disclosure: + 1 man-made mud volcano....

Javan mud volcano caused by drilling, not Quake! [berkley.edu]

Report confirmed! [sciencedaily.com]

Blog: Lusi. The Man-made Volcano.[highlyallochthonicarchive.blog.com]

P.S. And all of these man-made seismic and vulcanic phenomena could be used to Launch Space ships and Rockets etc! [ATS Thread]

Some more on injection wells.
This is not too far from yellowstone!

The first injection well was constructed in 1953 at the Idaho Chemical Processing Plant—now known as the Idaho Nuclear Technology and Engineering Center (INTEC). The well was used to dispose of low-level radioactive, chemical, and sanitary wastewater. Between 1953 and 1984, a yearly average of 360 million gallons of contaminated water were pumped down the 600-foot-deep injection well into the groundwater below INTEC. The well was used again in 1986, then sealed in 1989. It is the primary source of groundwater contamination at INTEC.

Another injection well is the primary source of groundwater contamination at Test Area North. A 305-foot deep well was used to dispose of low-level radioactive, chemical, and sewage wastewater from 1953 to 1972. The well left behind chemicals and radioactive contaminants, including trichloroethene, dichloroethene, tetrachloroethene, Cesium-137, Strontium-90, tritium, and uranium.

In addition, a 1,270-foot deep injection well was used at the Test Reactor Area (TRA) from 1964 to 1982. This well was used primarily for non-radioactive water used to cool reactors, and it is not a major contributor to groundwater contamination.

www.deq.state.id.us...


[edit on 31-1-2010 by dodadoom]

Considering the amount of unfounded accusations blaming HAARP for the recent spate of earthquakes recently I think this thread needs a timely bump.

Man can create earthquakes, just not the way a lot here believe.

Or you could try one of these...



Skip to 3:20 and watch 'till the end.

Nice list by the way. I suppose its just combating all the nonsense HAARP theories. You know what you've done now don't you? All the mining operations done in Chile and Haiti were all part of a conspiracy to cause an earthquake. Can't believe we didn't see this before. Riveting new insight into the true purpose of international mining corporations!