COLUMBIA, S.C. — There have been over 100 earthquakes in the past 7 days in Turkey and Syria with two being above a magnitude 7. The strongest, a magnitude 7.8 is almost 2 million times stronger than the 3.6 earthquake we saw on June 29th of last year in the Midlands.
Looking at the region the Anatolian Plate is moving against the Arabian Plate. The East Anatolian Fault where the earthquakes have been occurring is known as a strike-slip fault, similar to the famous San Andreas fault in California. In this situation the two plates rub up against each other until the immense energy is released in a powerful earthquake.
Here in the Midlands we have been dealing with our own earthquakes, 85 of them since late 2021 with the latest occurring on January 20th of this year.
Unlike the strike-slip fault in turkey our fault system is very old and not a boundary between plate. While there is some stress being released during these quakes, the potential for a very large earthquake in this type of setup is much lower.