/ Image: SCEC screenshot of USGS Recent Earthquakes Map. The most populated area near the epicenter was Ridgecrest, home to 28,000 people. The magnitude 7.1 event occurred about 34 hours after and about 7 miles northwest of a magnitude 6.4 foreshock on … But a network of smaller faults in this region also pose a major earthquake hazard, not only because they can themselves generate large quakes, but because shaking along one fault can cause others to come to life. Lithology and Stratigraphy. It displaces several of the mapped units of late Quaternary age but does not displace active or older alluvium deposits of late Holocene age. We were all put on alert. The foreshock originated along a strike-slip fault in the Eastern California Shear Zone, a region frequented by earthquake swarms, near the edge of Death Valley … Shaking can begin suddenly but have lasting impacts. This section does not cite any sources. Searles Valley Groundwater Basin • Groundwater Basin Number: 6-52 • County: Inyo, Kern, San Bernardino • Surface Area: 197,000 acres (308 square miles) Basin Boundaries and Hydrology . PDT (17:33 UTC) 7.5 mi (12.1 km) southwest of Searles Valley. Searles Valley is an ∼450 km 2 teardrop-shaped valley located north of the Garlock fault in the southwestern Basin and Range. The Searles Valley fault (W-directed normal fault) transfers slip onto the Panamint Valley zone, which changes from dominantly NNW-trending dextral strike-slip to more normal motion where they join. In conjunction with available slip rates for the Garlock fault, the geomorphic offsets suggest that average recurrence intervals are probably within the range of 600–1200 years south of El Paso Mountains, about 200–750 years in Searles Valley, about 200–1300 years in Pilot Knob Valley, and about 200–3000 years near Leach Lake and in the Avawatz Mountains.Published versio Red lines indicate previously mapped faults. The Garlock Fault marks the northern boundary of the area known as the Mojave Block, as well as the southern ends of the Sierra Nevada and the valleys of the westernmost Basin and Range province. Searles Valley. Our homes and towns here in the Mountain Communities are built on the San Andreas fault. "Some aftershocks have rumbled northwest of the Searles Valley earthquake, approaching the Owens Valley fault. [5] The El Paso Peaks paleoseismic site was first studied by McGill and Rockwell [1998], and it is the focus of this study. It has a hot, arid climate. This groundwater basin underlies Searles Valley in portions of San Bernardino, Inyo, and Kern Counties. 2, inset). The left-lateral Garlock Fault, 250 km long, bounds Searles Valley on the south and is the most geologically significant fault in the area. September 2019 Conference: 2019 SCEC Annual Meeting Poster #107 This subsection includes the Slate Range, El Paso Mountains, Quail Mountains, Owlshead Mountains, southern ends of the Argus and Panamint Ranges, Searles Valley, Long Valley, and the southern end of Panamint Valley. The maximum slip rate of the Garlock fault in southeastern Searles Valley is thus 11 mm/ 14 C yr. Like all of California, the Central Valley—which is ringed by faults—is earthquake country. A large quake on the Garlock fault has the potential to send strong shaking to the San Fernando Valley, Santa Clarita, Lancaster, Palmdale, Ventura, Oxnard, Bakersfield and Kern County, one of … Trenches T-9a and T-10 (Fig. Stretching for 250 kilometers (160 mi), it is the second-longest fault in California and one of the most prominent geological features in the southern part of the state . 200-750 years in Searles Valley, about 200-1300 years in Pilot Knob Valley, and about 200-3000 years near Leach Lake and in the Avawatz Mountains. The valley is bound on the west by the Argus Range and on the east by the Slate Range (Fig. On the 4th of July 2019, the magnitude-6.4 Searles Valley earthquake rattled the region around Ridgecrest, California. The July 5, 2019 magnitude 7.1 earthquake near eastern California’s Searles Valley resulted from shallow strike-slip faulting in the North America plate crust. (?) The Garlock fault extends from the San Andreas Fault in the west to Death Valley in the east, and hasn’t had a major earthquake in about 500 years. Paleoseismic Results from the Christmas Canyon West Site, Central Garlock Fault, Searles Valley, California Kyle A. Peña, Sally F. McGill, Ed J. Rhodes, James F. Dolan, Nathan D. Brown, Bryan A. Castillo, Alexandra E. Hatem, Sourav Saha, & Robert Zinke Submitted August 15, 2019, SCEC Contribution #9831, 2019 SCEC Annual Meeting Poster #107 The San Andreas fault system is to the west, the Garlock fault is to the south and the faults of the Sierra Nevada are to the east. MLRA 30g. An M6.4 foreshock in the region between the Searles Valley and Ridgecrest on July 4 was quickly followed by a significantly more powerful M7.1 mainshock on July 5. The Garlock Fault is a left-lateral strike-slip fault running northeast–southwest along the north margins of the Mojave Desert of Southern California, for much of its length along the southern base of the Tehachapi Mountains. The Owens Valley fault runs roughly northwest-southeast starting near the northern tip of the Ridgecrest fault, and it last ruptured in a large earthquake (about M7.8) in 1872. Searles Valley Earthquake Sequence including aftershocks as of July 9th, 2019 at 3:00 PM PT. Some aftershocks have rumbled northwest of the Searles Valley earthquake, approaching the Owens Valley fault. Southern California was just rocked by two major earthquakes only 34 hours and ~7 miles (11 km) apart. If part of the offset of the shoreline occurred during older lakestands, then the slip rate may be somewhat less. 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