fault lines have become active

Activities of defunct fault line
triggered Wednesday’s tremor

Two dormant fault lines have become active, say Institute of Seismological Research scientists

Dilip Patel
Fresh activities of a dormant fault line near Banni Rann triggered the tremors in Kutch and Saurashtra on Wednesday evening. This is the second instance within a month of a dormant fault line becoming active. On October 9, movements in another inactive fault line prompted the earthquake at Allahbund near Pakistan border.
Analysing the epicentre of Wednesday’s earthquake, scientists at the Institute of Seismological Research in Gandhinagar revealed that new tectonic movements along a 30-km-long inactive fault line had cased the tremors. They also found that its impact was felt in Ahmedabad, around 300 km from the epicentre of the quake. Such vast impact zone of tremor is rare world over, they observed.
While studying the earthquake of October 9, the scientists of the institute found that activities of a defunct fault line at Allahbund in the Rann of Kutch had caused the tremors. It was last active in 1819. The quake triggered by it 110 years ago led to the formation of Allahbund.
The scientists of the Institute of Seismological Research analysed every quake that rocked the state till date after the devastating earthquake in 2001. They have created a model on the movement of tectonic plates after studying them.
BK Rastogi, the director-general of the institute, said the model and the research papers on the earthquakes in the state would be presented before scientists from across the world at the World Seismological Conference in Hyderabad in February, 2010. The representatives of the Institute of Seismological Research will discuss at length the exceptionally vast impact area of the earthquakes with epicentres in Saurashtra and Kutch.
Frequent quakes measuring between 4 and 5 on Richter scale have been a regular phenomenon in Saurashtra and Kutch between 2001 and 2009. This year, five mild earthquakes occurred in Kutch. Besides the two quakes this month, the epicentre of the rest were near Bhachau, the epicentre of the devastating earthquake of 2001.