Earthquake Summary Poster
Poster of the Loyalty Islands Earthquake of 09 April 2008 - Magnitude 7.3
The posters may be downloaded for viewing or for printing on a color
plotter. Adobe PDF (.pdf) format files are provided. Adobe Acrobat 6.0 or
higher is required for viewing the PDF file on a computer monitor and for
printing the PDF map graphic. IMPORTANT: The PDF map graphic was produced
using TrueType fonts; change the following setting to:
Page(Print)Setup<Properties<Layout<Advanced<Graphic<TrueTypeFont<DownloadAsSoftFont
Attention MAC users: If you have problems viewing the pdf files, please download the pdf file and view it in the lastest verion of Adobe Acrobat.
DISCUSSION
The Loyalty Islands (New Hebrides arc) earthquake of April 9, 2008, occurred as the result of thrust-faulting on the boundary between the Australia plate and the New Hebrides plate. In the epicentral region of the earthquakes, the Australia plate moves east-northeast relative to the New Hebrides plate with a velocity of about 11 cm/yr. The Australia plate subducts beneath the New Hebrides plate and is seismically active to a depth of about 300 km northeast of the epicenter of the April 9 earthquake. The New Hebrides arc region of the Australia/New Hebrides plate-boundary experiences numerous strong earthquakes. In the past quarter century, the thousand kilometer section of the arc centered on the epicenter of the April 9 earthquake has produced over 20 earthquakes of magnitude 7 or greater, the largest having magnitude 7.7. |