Scientists think a significant earthquake in Southern California this week may have an unexpected cause, but it has rekindled fears of the ‘Big One’.
Stretching more than 100 miles across Southern California, from the US-Mexico border through San Diego and Riverside Counties, and up towards Los Angeles, is the little-known Elsinore fault, a branch of the notorious San Andreas fault.
Only 15 miles from San Diego County, the Elsinore fault is one of the biggest fault zones in Southern California, according to the California Institute of Technology.
Seismologist Lucy Jones cautioned that although Elsinore has been among the quietest in recorded history, it is still capable of produce an earthquake with a magnitude of up to 7.8.
According to statistics from the Southern California Earthquake Center and the US Geological Survey (USGS), large earthquakes with a magnitude of greater than 6.0 have
