Word: californiaisms
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...California's politicians have long boasted that their state is on the move. Scientists agree. On opposite sides of a 600-mile line called the San Andreas fault, the coastal strip of California is slowly but inexorably moving to the northwest while the remainder of the state is shifting toward the southeast...
This strange mobility of terrain is of more than academic interest. It produces the earthquakes that suddenly and with out warning jolt areas of California, occasionally with catastrophic results...
Although scientists are powerless to prevent earthquakes, they have high hopes that they can some day forecast them with reasonable accuracy. That day may not be far off. By carefully measuring movements along the San Andreas and nearby smaller faults, Seismologist Renner Hofmann says, he has successfully predicted recent California earthquakes. To prove that he is not merely displaying scientific hindsight, Hofmann has issued a new U.S. quake-cast. Within the next 18 months, he predicts, earthquakes of at least moderate intensity will rock areas near Santa Cruz and south of Bakersfield...
Between Two Points. A team led by Hofmann developed the quakecast method hile investigating fault zones for the California Department of Water Resources, which is understandably co cerned about the effects of earth slip page and quakes on its vast system of pumping plants, dams and aqueducts...
...repeating the measurement annually, he was able to determine with precision the amount and direction of movement that had taken place since the last measurement. Slowdowns & Reversals. At many observation points, along the San Andreas fault, the scientists found that California's coastal strip was moving to the northwest at a rate of two inches per year. In some areas, however, friction between the sliding masses of rock caused the movement to slow and even to stop. "When the fault sticks," Hofmann says, "the movement is transferred to smaller, adjacent faults that can stand only a limited amount...