SAN FRANCISCO EARTHQUAKE'

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLIII, Issue 13285, 18 September 1906, Page 6

SAN FRANCISCO EARTHQUAKE'

EARTH'S CRUST SHIFTED EIGHT FKF.T. Scientific investigation of the earthquake lias disclosed what is geologically known as a. "fault" at least 350 miles long, running near the Californian coast. Along this line there was a, sliding on one side for th*' whole distance. The earth's crust shifted its position for a distance of eight feat. This shifting was the earthquake. A geological commission appointed by the Governor of California has traced the line of the fault for the greater part of its distance. Herman Whitaker, in writing of the phenomenon, says the sliding rock masses on either side of the fault mav he represented by placing the palms of the hands together, the left standing for the Pacific Ocean and strip of coast line, the right, for the remainder of California. " Now shoot, the left hand forward, the right back. With a roar, a rumble, a crash, grinding of rociks, the cry of a world in pain, the strata breaks along the old fault. Zip, it slides eight feet, laterally, along the 225 miles of laud line, and nobody knows how many hundred more of ocean bed. The Pacific slides north eight feet; California, comes eight feet iouth— when the evidence is all in, the geological commission will tell us which."