Nicoya, Police News

Recent Seismic Activity in Nicoya Unrelated to 2012 Earthquake

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The tremors that Nicoyans have received in recent days shouldn’t be related to the earthquake that struck the area on September 5, 2012.

On Sunday, July 6, at 5:42 a.m. a 5.2 quake was recorded on the Richter scale with a depth of 34 kilometers, followed by another 3.7 quake with a depth of 24 kilometers.

On Tuesday night, the 9th, another 4.5 earthquake was recorded with a depth of 16 kilometers in the area of Mansion, Nicoya, followed by minor tremors, some of which were imperceptible.

According to seismologist Juan Mauricio Hernandez, of the National Seismological Network, it is very unlikely that the string of tremors that were felt could be related to the Nicoya earthquake of 2012, which had a magnitude of 7.6 and caused some serious structural damage but no fatalities.

“These are interesting earthquakes of regular intensity, but because of the low depth at which they have occurred, it is very unlikely that they are related to the earthquake that had its epicenter in Samara. According to the data that we deal with, this has to do with a normal seismic activity produced by the local Cocos fault,” Hernandez said.

This statement is the opposite of what is said by the experts at the Volcanological and Seismological Observatory of Costa Rica (OVSICORI – Observatorio Vulcanológico y Sismológico de Costa Rica), who made statements to the national news channel Repretel, assuring that the earthquake of July 9 occurred along a fault that was activated by the 2012 earthquake.

For his part, Hernandez said that the area is being monitored. “There’s no need to worry, in that it is part of the normal dynamics that are present in the area. At least it hasn’t gone beyond the normal pattern. However, we are monitoring the area to see what the behavior is in the coming days.”

Hernandez recommended being alert. “The first thing is not to panic or create false alarms and at the same time, preventive measures issued by the National Emergency Commission should be maintained since an event of this nature is unpredictable, but the best way to prevent it is to be prepared,” Hernandez indicated.

This newspaper tried to obtain the version of OVSICORI but after several attempts, we could not locate them.

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