Chile Earthquake: The Earth Moved Literally

At the website Wired.com, they have some great charts of how the Chilean city Concepcion moved 10 feet to the west after the 8.8 magnitude earthquake. From the article:

Precise GPS measurements from before and after the earthquake, the fifth largest ever recorded by seismographs, show that the country’s capital, Santiago, moved 11 inches west. Even Buenos Aires, nearly 800 miles from the epicenter, shifted an inch. The image above uses red arrows to represent the relative direction and magnitude of the ground movement in the vicinity of the quake.The analysis comes from a project led by Ohio State earth scientist Mike Bevis that has been using GPS to record movements of the crust on Chile since 1993. The area is of particular interest to geoscientists because it is an active subduction zone, where an oceanic plate is colliding with a continental plate and being pushed into the Earth’s molten mantle below.

Wow! I wish we had the crew of the Enterprise from the episode entitled "Pen Pals" in which Data has contact with a a young alien girl whose planet is ravaged by earthquakes. He breaks the rules of the Prime Directive and helps her and her world. The Enterprise and crew through advanced technology is able to stabilize the the crust thus ending the earthquake and volcanic activity.
Right now, I would settle for an early warning system that would let us folks that live in earthquake zones at least get out of a building before the quake hits!
You can read the article about the earthquake HERE.

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• Chile Earthquake Moved Entire City 10 Feet to the West (wired.com)