Second Major Earthquake hits Cephalonia island in Greece; causes significant damage; information hub established on GeoWorld; updates to follow

A new Mw 5.7 earthquake hit Cephalonia at 5:08 am on February 3^rd 2014, less than 10 days after the Mw 5.9-6.1 earthquake that caused also significant damage, as reported by an earlier news item here. The two earthquakes took place on the same, well-known fault. The new earthquake has caused significant damage to buildings, ports, and houses. The ports of Lixouri and Argostoli have suffered significant damage due to liquefaction and lateral spreading. Damage includes liquefaction related failures in infrastructure, as well as numerous landslides, rock slides and other instabilities. Recorded accelerations are in the order of 0.7g in places, and it appears that following the earlier earthquake a significant number of strong motion stations had been placed on the island and have recorded the event.

Seismologists are not able to make specific predictions, but expressed concern for another, third major earthquake that may reach a magnitude of 7. However, details are not yet clear and time is needed for the phenomenon to be better understood.

Geoengineer.org has established on GeoWorld an open, information hub that will allow seismic engineers to post information related to the earthquake, as well as receive notifications about new information as it becomes available. The Hub is available here: http://www.mygeoworld.com/groups/profile/66503/cephalonia-2014-earthquake-sequence-information-hub.

Geoengineer.org’s geotechnical engineers are traveling to the island to inspect damage and will be sharing this information as soon as it becomes available.