alt Hacker NewsI’m genuinely asking here - is climate change thought to have influence on earthquakes? I wouldn’t have expected so, but maybe there are some non-obvious pathways for it to be the case?
Replies
pennomi • today at 1:31 PM
I have a vivid recollection of a crotchety old man in Southern California telling me “yup, this is earthquake weather” on a hot, clear day. (There wasn’t an earthquake that day.) It was so bizarre and disconnected from science that it was burned into my mind. Thanks for unlocking that memory.
That being said, there is some redistribution of tectonic weight that may happen due to entire ice caps melting… that has the potential to trigger movement.
In theory - maybe - melting of glaciers and polar icecaps could be a factor - but not everywhere:
- https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-climate-chang... - https://www.weforum.org/stories/climate-action/climate-chang...
(Thinking that perhaps the hailstones were what the original commenter was referring too - although, perhaps the gods are just unhappy with the state of the world overall - this isn't the first big earthquake this year, huge numbers of forest fires, record heat levels...)