Media Releases and Opportunities

New research into the Queen Charlotte fault system has produced the first images of the fault zone architecture offshore Haida Gwaii that confirm that the area off northern British Columbia can produce so-called megathrust earthquakes, which can generate strong tremors and tsunamis. Megathrusts are found in areas where a tectonic plate dives beneath another, in this case the Pacific plate being pushed under North American plate.

Scientists from American and Canadian universities, including Dalhousie University, used a state-of-the-art 15-kilometre-long hydrophone streamer with thousands of underwater microphones, to collect data in the area and map the deep structure of the Earth's subsurface.

The study, published today in the journal Science Advances, provides the first conclusive evidence of the Pacific plate partially colliding with and diving beneath the North American plate in the Haida Gwaii region. In simple terms, this means that this area can produce the type of earthquakes which, in addition to producing strong ground shaking, can generate tsunamis.

The Queen Charlotte fault system represents the greatest seismic hazard in Canada, producing the country's largest recorded earthquake in 1949.

Dr. Mladen Nedimovic, a Killam professor in Dalhousie's Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, co-authored the report and is available to discuss how understanding these fault geometries is essential for future earthquake forecasting and tsunami simulations.

                                                                                -30-

Media contact:

Alison Auld
Senior Research Reporter
Dalhousie University
Cell: 1-902-220-0491
Email: alison.auld@dal.ca