TJ Madsen is among the founding members of the New Herald Tribune and chairs the editorial board. He worked for national syndicated newspapers in Newark, Philadelphia, and Baltimore before moving to the midwest.
June 2 , 2024
Orinda, CA - A wildfire that erupted Saturday afternoon near Tracy, California has been linked to a highly unusual 2.4 magnitude earthquake that shook the nearby town of Orinda, about 60 miles west of the blaze.
The Corral Fire, as it has been named by Cal Fire officials, ignited around 2:15 pm in grasslands just south of Tracy. Pushed by gusty winds, the fire quickly grew to over 1,000 acres, forcing evacuations in rural areas of San Joaquin County.
Then at 4:37 pm, while firefighters were working to contain the Corral Fire's rapid spread, residents in Orinda and surrounding cities felt a jolt from a 2.4 magnitude earthquake centered just northwest of the town. The quake was widely felt but caused no reports of damage or injuries.
Seismologists at UC Berkeley were initially baffled by the quake, given its shallow depth of only 3 miles and location away from any major fault lines. However, after examining data from a variety of sensors, they made a startling connection to the wildfire over 60 miles away.
"Our analysis indicates this quake was triggered by tremendous atmospheric disturbances from the intense heat and smoke of the Corral Fire," said Dr. Samantha Roberts, the lead researcher investigating the event. "The fire's immense energy had enough of an effect on the overlying air pressure to cause flexing and a disturbance in the earth's crust in Orinda."
Roberts explained that while earthquakes triggered by nuclear tests or large conventional explosions are well documented, quakes sparked by wildfires are extremely rare and poorly understood. Only a handful of possible cases have been proposed by scientists previously.
"This is an extraordinary occurrence that we've never seen before in California," Roberts stated. "While the magnitude is modest, the ability of a large wildfire's atmospheric forces to cause intraplate seismic movement is remarkable. It's a phenomenon we will be intensely studying."
The connection between the Corral Fire and the Orinda quake remains classified as the likely cause pending further investigation. However, the incident has opened new lines of research into the complex atmospheric-terrestrial interactions that may be possible from severe wildfires.
As of late Saturday, the Corral Fire remained only 15% contained with over 2,500 acres burned in San Joaquin County's dry grasslands and rolling hills. Over 100 structures were threatened, but no homes had been destroyed as of this report. The cause of the fire is still under investigation.
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