Quake Lake
by Cindy Murphy - NightVisions
Title
Quake Lake
Artist
Cindy Murphy - NightVisions
Medium
Photograph
Description
Madison River, Earthquake lake taken from route 287. On Aug. 17, 1959 the earth around Yellowstone shook. At 11:37 p.m. a 7.3 magnitude earthquake devastated Hebgen Lake, Montana, located in Yellowstone�s northwestern region�in comparison, the 2010 earthquake in Haiti registered at a 7.0 magnitude.
Resulting Landslide Killed 28 People and formed Quake Lake
The quake caused massive damage, including 28 fatalities and a considerable $11 million in repairs to highways and timbers. Comparably, recent small quakes in Yellowstone (also called an �earthquake swarm�) registered at 0.6 to 3.6 on the Richter scale.
Joann Smith, who was 11 years old at the time of the disaster, recalled the horror of the event for a 50th anniversary article for the Denver Post published Aug. 17, 2009.
�It was frightening. It was horrible,� she said. �You could actually see the ground open up.�
Smith�s recollections aren�t exaggerated. The United States Geological Survey calls the earthquake the worst on record in Montana (records date back to 1869). At the time, it was the second worst earthquake to occur in the lower 48 states.
The event caused a massive avalanche of rock, soil and trees (an estimated 28-33 million cubic meters of material), which descended down from the Madison River Canyon�s south wall at nearly 100 mph. It took less than one minute for the 80 million tons of rock to slam into the narrow canyon, blocking the river and creating Earthquake Lake. img163 836
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October 31st, 2016
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