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07. 06. 12. - 17:00

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07. 06. 12. - 17:00

Series of minor earthquakes shake Romania

Michael Leidig

Four minor earthquakes shacked Romania in only several hours today (Thurs), the Institute for the Earth Physics informed.

The tremors had the epicentre in Vrancea region (centre), an area of intense sesimic activity and another one in Transylvania. The smallest had 2.7 degrees on Richter scale  and the most important 3.3 degrees on Richter scale. No damages had been registered and the tremors had not been felt by the public.

According to Constantin Ionescu, the director of the Earth Physics Institute the earthquakes in Romania are not linked to the earthquakes recently produced in Italy and Bulgaria.

Ionescu claims the seismic activity in Vrancea is normal for this time of the year, with some 15 tremors a month.

"There's no record of an intensification of the seismic activities but we cannot say either that we are going through a calm period right now. We cannot forecast a big earthquake, we are just conducting studies and monitor the seismic activity and we correlate it with the magnetic activity in Vrancea. There are many who are claiming that  a magnitude six or even higher earthquake is expected to occur this year, but they are not specifying that the window of occurrence is up to five years. There is the possibility to have an earthquake of up to 5.9  magnitude, but this kind of tremor does not generate damages. The dangerous earthquakes in Romania are those above magnitude 7 on Richter scale", Ionescu said.

The last deadly earthquake in Vrancea occurred on 4 March 1977, 21:20 local time and was felt throughout the Balkans. It had a magnitude of 7.2 with an epicentre in Vrancea at a depth of 94 kilometers. The earthquake killed about 1,578 people (1,424 in Bucharest) in Romania, and wounded more than 11,300.

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