I live in the Mojave desert just north of Palm Springs, I have experienced several
earthquakes in my time. One of them was the famous Landers quake in 1992, it was close to
an 8 magnitude. Ever since that day I became fascinated with their strange behavior.
All of southern California is scared with fault lines, all of which are due to the effect
of the San Andreas fault/plate boundary, which is where the North American plate and the Pacific plate have collided. It was once a subduction zone meaning the plates collided and one was going over or under the other. Now, it is a strike slip zone, this includes the whole length of the fault, 900 miles all the way from southern Mexico up to Oregon. The western portion of our beautiful country was formed from the San Andreas, all of our mountains from the Colorado Rockies to the San Bernardinos are the affect of this fault. The truth is, Ca
will never drop off in the ocean, and if it does it will be a slow process. As for L.A the city is a good distance from the fault, it is a common misconception that the fault goes straight under the city. The Coachella valley is at major risk, I work directly on top of the fault in Thousand Palms CA. Fortunately Palm Springs doesn’t have any sky scrapers. Cal Tech
believes that is going to be the next rupture point is on the Salton region, they name the fault in segments, the Salton region is the stretch that runs from the Salton Sea, to the Cojon Pass off I15. Since the San Andreas is a strike slip it should be creeping almost every day, it does in the north near San Fransisco but not here. Thats why they think it is going to rupture on the Salton region, it hasn’t moved for over 100 years. Without a doubt the fault is what made this state so diverse, you can drive from the beach to the mountains or the desert within a short amount of time. It seems that earthquakes are frightening, but they are so beautiful at the same time. Perhaps one day we will understand them fully, until then we can only theorize.
