Fears ‘Big One’ earthquake is on the way after a flurry of volcanic activity in the Ring of Fire
OVER the past few weeks earthquakes have hit Japan, Mexico and Taiwan and volcanoes have erupted around the Pacific's 'Ring of Fire'.
Now scientists have warned that the frequent seismic activity, which has already claimed lives, could mean a huge quake is on the way.
A new study from California says that the cluster of tremors around the planet's so-called Ring of Fire- a horseshoe-shaped geological disaster zone - could indicate the "big one" is due to hit, the Mail Online reports.
The research, published in the journal Science Advances, involved analysis of 101 major earthquakes around the Pacific Ring of Fire between 1990 and 2016.
Thorne Lay, professor of Earth and planetary sciences at UC Santa Cruz, said: "Based on the clustering of earthquakes in space and time, the area that has just slipped is actually more likely to have another failure."
He added that despite the stress on the fault being lowered to below failure level, "the surrounding areas have been pushed towards failure in many cases, giving rise to aftershocks and the possibility of an adjacent large rupture sooner rather than later."
The prof told the Mail Online: "Taiwan, Guam and Japan are far apart relative to the static stress interactions, but one could examine the seismic shaking from an earlier event in the region of a later event to see if small earthquakes were triggered as the seismic waves went by which could have led to a cascade of failures culminating in a larger event.
"Until that type of analysis is done, causal connection between the events is very speculative.
"Earthquakes are happening frequently in the Ring of Fire, and some apparent space-time clustering could arise from purely random (non-interacting) activity."
The study comes after the Ring of Fire was rocked by a spate of earthquakes in the first two weeks of February.
More than 180 people were injured and 17 people killed when a 6.4 magnitude quake struck Taiwan's east coast on February 6.
On Tuesday a series of tremors reaching magnitudes as high as 5.7 shook the US island territory of Guam.
Since February 11, three earthquakes have hit Japan, the largest measured at 4.8 on the Richter scale and was 103 kilometres from Hachijo.
But scientists have reassured the public, saying such activity is normal for the Ring of Fire and dismissed specualtion of a "domino effect" triggering a bigger quake.
Toshiyasu Nagao, head of Tokyo-based Tokai UNiversity's Earthquake Prediction Research Centre, told Japan Times: "The Pacific Rim is in a period of activity.
"In terms of volcanic history, however the current activity is still regarded as normal."
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In January, at least four natural disasters, including numerous volcanic eruptions, hit the Pacific Rim.
Japan's Mount Kusatsu-Shirane killed one person and injured 15 when it erupted and Mopunt Mayon in the Philiphines sent lava soaring 60-0 metres into the air, forcing more than 60,000 to evacuate nearby villages.
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