2012-10-23, 10:58 AM
Alex123123 Wrote:@ DarkForge: Puerto Rico is 100 years overdue for an 8 and we rarely get anything above 5. Doesn't mean the area is not active. Plus geologically speaking, 60 years is not even a grain of sand in the time scale.
And keep in mind that Japan and S.America sits next to the "ring of fire", the most tectonically active boundaries on Earth. Any other plate in comparison to that will seem like child's play. Heck, I bet Japan laughs at 5 pointers while we on the Caribbean behave like it's the end of the world every time we get anything close to a 5.
@ KhainiWest: That's pretty much what they are tasked to do. The population here is on a constant silent "panic mode" due to the agencies constant reminder of major earthquake potential. Not saying it's a bad thing though. If on an instant of panic the people are able to instinctively "duck-cover-hold", the odds of having more people surviving are better than if you just leave them do their standard "pomegranate-pray-run". And if it does not work, at least the scientists here will not be charged with manslaughter.
But at what point would the warnings be too many? I don't blame the residents for being terrified but it's pretty much a given that the seismologists encounter things like this all the time so their understanding of the situation is based more on whether this reading actually says "Oh pineapple, better start moving out!" than working on what people are feeling they should say (It's implied that they were somewhat pressured to give a definite yes or no answer when they couldn't). You also have to consider the impact on economy and human lives every time people are told to evacuate so it's really not so simple as to say one more warning is better than none as the Earth on the whole is actually very active, we just don't notice it in our daily lives.