Venezuela’s Powerful Earthquake Was a Rare Double ‘Earthquake’

Venezuela announced that a The following national emergency two earthquakes of 7.2 and 7.5 magnitude that happened just 39 seconds ago on Wednesday. This, known as a seismic doublet, is rare.

However, there are events recorded in different parts of the world that continue to be studied to increase our understanding of the ways in which stress is transferred within the earth’s crust and the connection between geological faults.

The US Geological Survey said that all these earthquakes began in the northwest of the town of Yumare, near the city of Moron and about 160 kilometers (99 miles) west of the Venezuelan capital of Caracas. These earthquakes occurred at a depth of 20.3 and 10 kilometers and were felt in a large area of ​​northern Venezuela and several Caribbean countries.

The sequence was classified as a seismic doublet, a phenomenon that occurs when there are two similar large earthquakes hitting almost simultaneously in nearby areas. According to the USGS comparisonthe probability that an earthquake will be followed by another strong one in the nearby area within a week is about 5 percent.

One of the most dramatic earthquakes in recent history occurred about three years ago in Turkey and Syria, when a 7.6-magnitude earthquake was followed by a 7.8-magnitude one. Some research showed that the event was the result of tectonic stress that had accumulated for more than two hundred years due to the first earthquake. When it erupted, it released stress that was transferred to a nearby fault, quickly triggering a second event.

A house in Catia La Mar, Venezuela, was badly damaged after the earthquake hit twice.

Photo: Juan BARRETO/AFP via Getty Images

How Does a Seismic Doublet Occur?

Experts believe that the same thing may have happened in Venezuela. Mark Allen, a professor in the Department of Earth Sciences at Durham University, explains in a statement from Spain’s SMC that “it appears that the first earthquake caused part of the fault to break and the fault transferred to another fault, which ruptured, causing the second earthquake.”

Allen also noted that the geological features of the area where the epicenters were located played an important role. “It seems that these things happened on the border of the mountains between South America and the Caribbean.” In this area, the rocks flow in one direction, similar to what happens along the coast. San Andreas Fault in California,” he says.

This causes earthquakes, which occur when two blocks of the earth’s crust move smoothly across each other and suddenly release the stress that has been accumulated over a long period of time.