Darvel Bay Seismic Advisory

Post date: Oct 1, 2017 2:44:19 PM

It has been a while since i make any update or advisory on earthquake in Sabah region. Lately, there are some seismic activities which triggered magnitude 3.9 Richter scale last weekend.

2. According to Prof. Dr. Felix Tongkul, the next big one probably will happen around Darvel Bay and an approximate guess by Prof would be area between Lahad Datu and Kunak.

3.It is not an assumption which was made without justification but it involves some cyclic approach although there are cases of which occurred randomly.

4. After going through my data bank, I chose a vicinity where epic centers traversed throughout this fault line and the cyclic occurrence is around 16 years. That is through simple check.

5. 1976 (25th and 26th July) has been the worst year with multiple event of earthquake more than 5.0 and up to 6.2. The rest occurred in 1984 with magnitude of 5.6, 1994 with magnitude of 5.7 and 2008 with magnitude of 5.0.

6. This shows that the cyclic is between 8 to 14 years and average of 11 years. It is almost the 9th year without major earthquake happening within Darvel Bay. So there is a high possibility, a high magnitude seismic event may occur within the next 2 years. What is worrying about some of the epicenters from past event is the proximity of these epicenters to fault lines. some are not close to fault lines. Some are easy to predict based on intersecting point between thrust fault line with inactive fault lines or active normal fault lines with inactive ones.

7. From seismotectonic map, there is one normal active fault line which is relatively close (2-6kM) to the Lahad Datu town and epicenters of earthquake with magnitude above 5.0 is only 8-10KM away from this town.

8. Another correlation made shows that most epicenters are sitting on Kennedy Bay (36) type of soil, Kretam (33) type of soil and Gumpal (46) type of soil. No summation can be made at this point of time.

9. Disclaimer: This short note should be treated as a supplementary to discretion made by Prof. Dr Felix Tongkul and should not be interpreted as precise.