Vancouver Island will rip open like a zipper when overdue earthquake hits, seismologists

Experts have warned that if a mega-thrust earthquake were to hit the Vancouver Island, like it did around 315 years ago, the Earth could rip open like a zipper and the people living along the outer coast would only have between 15 and 20 minutes to escape.

On Jan. 26, 1700 at about 9 p.m., a magnitude 9 earthquake struck the Pacific coast, causing violent shaking for minutes that scientists believe was felt as far away as the Manitoba border. The shaking was followed almost immediately by a tsunami that legend and scientists say sucked everybody and everything along the outer coast into the ocean.

About nine hours later, a tsunami the height of a four-storey building hit the Japanese coast on Jan. 27, 1700, destroying all in its path.

Earthquakes and tsunamis like the Vancouver Island and Boxing Day events are not one-time occurrences, due to their locations near major fault lines that build up pressure over 300 to 500 years and eventually cause the earth to buckle and let go, scientists say.
[link to canadajournal.net]