Powerful 5.9 magnitude earthquake in Alaska

USGS map.

December 01, 2012 - ALASKA - Residents on Kodiak Island and the Kenai Peninsula in the state of Alaska were shaken awake at 11:00pm on Friday night as a 5.9 magnitude earthquake shook the region, but there are no immediate reports of any damages. The strong quake struck the Alaska Peninsula/ South Central region with a great deal of strength. It wasn’t like the mild succession of quakes that occurred Thursday.

The Alaska Earthquake Information Center says the quake was widely felt.


Jeff Antill wrote to us saying, “I felt and heard the 5.8 quake here in Anchorage. Our roof is heavy timbers and it makes alot of noise in even the smallest quakes. This one shook everything quite well.”

On the other hand, Chris Bryant says, “It wasn’t too bad. It felt like somebody was running on the deck outside. I only knew it was a quake because of the vibrations left over after the initial jolt.”

The Kodiak Police Department says there were no reports of damage or other problems early Saturday.
A quake of this size has the capacity to cause considerable damage under some circumstances.

The quick jolt occurred 69 miles north of Larsen Bay and 238 miles southwest of Anchorage. It was generated at a depth of 52.1 miles beneath the surface on the mainland across from Kodiak Island. The location of this earthquake was equidistant between the long quiet region of Devil’s Desk and Kaguyak Volcano. Devil’s Desk is a volcanic neck of a former stratovolcano now completely surrounded by Hook Glacier. Erosion has removed most of the stratovolcano. Wes Hildreth of USGS as well as others state that Devil’s Desk was active 292,000 years ago to the Holocene.

Kaguyak Volcano is another stratovolcano that had its last major eruption about 5,800 years before present, and has been largely quiet since that time with no recent eruptions or activity for at least the last 1,200 years. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s West Coast and Alaska Tsunami Warning Center issued a statement advising that there was no tsunami danger from this quake.

The U.S. Geological survey has detected 20 earthquakes today, 214 earthquakes in the past 7 days, 830 earthquakes in the past month, and 17,479 earthquakes in the past year.

The Alaska quake was first reported as having a 5.6 magnitude energy level, however, seismologist changed it to a 5.9 in the last hour. - Guardian Express.