Earth moves more in Northern Cape
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Augrabies - 120915 - The Augrabies waterfalls on the Orange river just outside of Augrabies - Photo: Matthew Jordaan Augrabies - 120915 - The Augrabies waterfalls on the Orange river just outside of Augrabies - Photo: Matthew Jordaan
Cape Town - Northern Cape residents felt the Earth move 187 times last year, according to the Council for Geoscience.
“Seismic activity in the Northern Cape was high... with 187 earthquakes having been recorded,” the council said in its 2012/13 annual report, tabled at Parliament on Friday.
Of these, 113 occurred in the Augrabies area.
“The earthquakes appeared as a seismic swarm ranging in size from local magnitude scale 0.3 to 4.1.”
Other provinces were shaken too, though not so often, and the earthquakes they experienced were mainly of a magnitude deemed micro, minor, or light.
“Ten earthquakes occurred in the Western Cape during the year. The largest measured 4.1 on the local magnitude scale and was located in the Leeu-Gamka area.”
The Eastern Cape had experienced three earthquakes, there were 19 in the Free State, nine in Gauteng, and 24 in North West.
“Limpopo... experienced diffuse tectonic seismicity and 14 earthquakes were recorded.”
In Mpumalanga, there were 10 earthquakes, the largest - which measured ML 5.0 - in the Piet Retief area.
The biggest earthquake last year in the southern African sub-continent occurred in Mozambique's Zambesia Province. It measured a moderate ML 5.7 though no reports of damage or injuries were received.
South Africa's landlocked neighbour, Lesotho, experienced a total of 37 small earthquakes during the same period, ranging in size from ML 1.3 to 2.9. - Sapa