Earthquake phoenix

Although nearby states are no stranger to large earthquakes, it's rare for Arizona to experience earthquakes as large as the ones that shook residents Sunday night. The United States Geological Survey's database shows just 11 earthquakes of magnitude 4 of greater have been centered in Arizona since record-keeping began.

Two of those 11 quakes occurred on Sunday night. There has never been an earthquake recorded in Arizona that caused any injuries or death , according to a separate USGS report. Daily 25 Today. By Sean Breslin November 02, This does not mean Arizona is seismically inactive. In fact, geophysicists have recorded hundreds of quakes each year in the state, though most are too small to be felt by humans.

Central Arizona is seismically quieter, however. Researchers haven't yet fully analyzed Sunday's quakes, which occurred between the depths of 3.

However, it's likely that the quakes occurred as a result of extensional forces pulling the crust apart in the area, Porter said. Arizona's seismic profile is split into three parts, according to the Arizona Geological Survey. In the northeast corner, east of the seismic belt, is the Colorado Plateau, a tectonically stable island in the crust that also covers parts of Colorado, Utah and New Mexico.

The southern part of the state is the "basin and range" region, a landscape that alternates mountain ranges with basins or valleys. The topography of this region forms when the crust pulls apart, creating faults. On one side of the faults, the uplift of the crust forms abrupt, steep mountains; on the other side, the dropping of the crust creates flat basins.

Between these two regions is the transition zone, a rugged geological gray area that slices from the northwestern corner of Arizona through the central part of the state, running between Flagstaff and Phoenix, and finally to the eastern border of the state. This transition zone marks the change from the stable, tectonically quiet Colorado Plateau to the stretched-apart basin and range geology to the south.

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