Sue Surkes is The Times of Israel’s environment reporter.
There have been no recent signs of an impending powerful earthquake in Israel that could be triggered by the powerful temblors that rocked Turkey and Syria, although the issue is hard to predict with currently available technology, earthquake experts said Monday.
Historically, Israel has experienced severe earthquakes once a century, on average. The last one occurred in 1927. Israel lies along the Great Rift Valley, also known as the Syrian-African Rift or the Dead Sea Transform, which is vulnerable to earthquakes.
“It’s very hard to point to a direct link and say how an earthquake in Turkey might affect earthquakes in Israel,” Prof. Zohar Gvirtzman, director of Israel’s Geological Survey, told The Times of Israel.
“It’s correct that all the tectonic plates touch one another, but the systems are so complex that it’s difficult to give a prediction.”
Asked about recent seismic activity in Israel, he said his agency had found nothing out of the ordinary.
“We monitor earthquakes all the time and there has been nothing unusual,” he said.
Related from our archive: A million homes at risk of collapse by earthquake — report
Related, from our archive: Major earthquake, killing hundreds, likely to hit Israel in coming years – study
Ron Avni, an earthquake studies lecturer at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev in Beersheba, said that since the East Anatolian Fault, along which Monday’s two massive quakes took place, is connected to the Syrian African Rift, any big tremor in the former could — but also could not — trigger a major one in the latter, which would affect Israel.
Avni said: “The mechanisms aren’t understood well enough. Our knowledge is empirical — it’s based on what we know about previous earthquakes.”
“We know about plate tectonics. But it is impossible to predict exactly when the big one will occur in Israel.”
In February last year, the Geological Survey of Israel unveiled cutting-edge technology capable of sensing the first sign of an earthquake and having the Home Front Command send out an alert within ten seconds.
A press briefing to announce the new system was brought forward in February 2022 after a 3.7-magnitude quake centered in the Jordan Valley shook Israel the month before.
Called TRUAA and based on a system developed at Berkley University in California that went live in 2019, the NIS 45 million ($14 million) early warning system had put Israel on a par with a small number of other nations such as the US, Taiwan and Japan.
Gvirtzman told the briefing at the launch of TRUAA that current technology could not yet predict the location, timing or strength of an earthquake.
But, by picking up the initial, weaker tremor that precedes a stronger one, it could get the information out quickly in the hope that as many Israelis as possible within range would have time to seek protection, he said.
There’s no paywall on The Times of Israel, but the journalism we do is costly. As an independent news organization, we are in no way influenced by political or business interests. We rely on readers like you to support our fact-based coverage of Israel and the Jewish world. If you appreciate the integrity of this type of journalism, please join the ToI Community.
We’re really pleased that you’ve read X Times of Israel articles in the past month.
That’s why we started the Times of Israel eleven years ago – to provide discerning readers like you with must-read coverage of Israel and the Jewish world.
So now we have a request. Unlike other news outlets, we haven’t put up a paywall. But as the journalism we do is costly, we invite readers for whom The Times of Israel has become important to help support our work by joining The Times of Israel Community.
For as little as $6 a month you can help support our quality journalism while enjoying The Times of Israel AD-FREE, as well as accessing exclusive content available only to Times of Israel Community members.
Thank you,
David Horovitz, Founding Editor of The Times of Israel
Today’s Daily Briefing
Open-ended IDF operation targets terror ‘city of refuge’ Jenin
SAVING LIVES AROUND THE GLOBE
Sponsored
&
Signed, Sealed, Delivered?
A fresh look at Israel’s founding moral compass