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Tuesday, December 24, 2013

El Hierro earthquake activity increase in Dec. 2013

On the neighbouring Island of El Hierro erthquake activity has increased quite substantially once again. While the past few months were relatively quiet seismically, the stronger and more frequent activity has started again on Sunday, Dec. 22nd 2013. when 73 shocks were recorded and yesterday 100. Most of the earthquakes were minor and below 2,5 on the Richter scale, but also some of around magnitude 3 were registered and these were felt by the island's population. Scientists say that the activity is a harmless natural process as new lava seems to be thrusting upwards and this tension is causing the earthquake 'swarm'. Most of these quakes happened directly under the island, but the majority were at depths of between 13 and 18 kilometres, which is considered safe. Since the start of the activity in the summer of 2011 more than 20800 earthquakes have been recorded on El Hierro, most of them minor shocks.
See previous post about the El Hierro earthquakes and eruption.
Important update: 5.1 quake
Further update: Aftershocks...
Earthquake locations since Dec. 22nd, 2013

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