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V.—On the British Earthquakes of 18891

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 May 2009

Charles Davison*
Affiliation:
Mathematical Master in King Edward's High School, Birmingham

Extract

Time of occurrence, 13 h. 58 m.; Intensity, about IV. Epicentrum, probably not far from Ben Nevis.

I am indebted to Mr. E. T. Omond, Director of the Ben Nevis Observatory, for the only information I have been able to obtain with reference to this earthquake. “It was,” he says, “sufficiently strong to make part of the wooden roof creak, but was, as far as I know, not noticed in any other part of the country.” The few inquiries that I have been able to make confirm this remark, and I think we may therefore conclude that the epicentrum cannot have been very distant from Ben Nevis. The great fault, which crosses Scotland from Inverness in a south-westerly direction, passes at the surface within a short distance from Ben Nevis; and being, in other parts of its course, closely associated with recent earthquakes, may possibly, by a slip, have given rise to the Ben Nevis shock.

Type
Original Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1891

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Footnotes

1

There is nothing new in this. Dr. Alexis A. Julien explained in this way the formation of the irony casts in the “Northampton Sands,” which are well known. See “Amer. Assoc. Adv. Sci.” for 1879.

References

page 364 note 2 Plate X. illustrates the area disturbed by the Lancashire Earthquake of February 10th, 1889, described in the GEOLOGICAL MAGAZINE for July, 1891, pp. 306316,Google Scholar forming part 2 of this communication.

page 365 note 1 This earthquake was felt over the greater part of northern Scotland.

page 367 note 1 Geol. Mag. Dec. II. Vol. X. pp. 120–8, 193–7, 337–44 (1883).Google Scholar