The 2010 Kalgoorlie–Boulder earthquake was a 5.2

earthquake An earthquakealso called a quake, tremor, or tembloris the shaking of the Earth's surface resulting from a sudden release of energy in the lithosphere that creates seismic waves. Earthquakes can range in intensity, from those so weak they ...

that occurred near the city of

Kalgoorlie–Boulder Kalgoorlie-Boulder (or just Kalgoorlie) is a city in the Goldfields–Esperance region of Western Australia, located east-northeast of Perth at the end of the Great Eastern Highway. It is referred to as Kalgoorlie–Boulder as the surrounding ...

Western Australia Western Australia (WA) is the westernmost state of Australia. It is bounded by the Indian Ocean to the north and west, the Southern Ocean to the south, the Northern Territory to the north-east, and South Australia to the south-east. Western Aust ...

on 20 April 2010, at approximately 8:17 am WST. The earthquake caused major damage to the historic buildings in Kalgoorlie–Boulder. Its

epicenter The epicenter (), epicentre, or epicentrum in seismology is the point on the Earth's surface directly above a hypocenter or focus, the point where an earthquake or an underground explosion originates. Determination The primary purpose of a ...

was approximately

southwest The points of the compass are a set of horizontal, radially arrayed compass directions (or azimuths) used in navigation and cartography. A '' compass rose'' is primarily composed of four cardinal directions—north, east, south, and west— ...

of Kalgoorlie, at a depth of . The duration of shaking lasted about 10–15 seconds and was felt up to away. It was also the largest recorded in the Goldfields region in terms of magnitude and one of the largest in Australia in terms of resulting damage. No one was killed but two people were treated at Kalgoorlie Hospital for minor injuries resulting from the earthquake. It resulted in the temporary closure of local

gold mine Gold mining is the extraction of gold by mining. Historically, mining gold from alluvial deposits used manual separation processes, such as gold panning. The expansion of gold mining to ores that are not on the surface has led to more comple ...

s including the

Super Pit gold mine The Fimiston Open Pit, colloquially known as the Super Pit, is an open-pit mine in Australia. It was Australia's largest open cut gold mine until 2016, when it was surpassed by the Newmont Boddington gold mine, also in Western Australia. The ...

.Australia's Super Pit gold mine reopens after quake
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References

External links

Australian Goldfields rocked by largest earthquake in 50 years
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Times Online ''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its modern name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper ''The Sunday Times'' (fo ...

Biggest quake in 50 years hits Australia's Goldfields
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Agence France-Presse Agence France-Presse (; AFP) is a French international news agency headquartered in Paris, France. Founded in 1835 as Havas, it is the world's oldest news agency. With 2,400 employees of 100 nationalities, AFP has an editorial presence in 260 c ...

Moderate earthquake rattles Western Australia Goldfields
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Herald Sun The ''Herald Sun'' is a Conservatism, conservative daily tabloid newspaper based in Melbourne, Australia, published by The Herald and Weekly Times, a subsidiary of News Corp Australia, itself a subsidiary of the American Rupert Murdoch, Murd ...

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...

Kalgoorlie-Boulder earthquake April 2010 in Australia Earthquakes in Western Australia Goldfields–Esperance 2010s in Western Australia {{Earthquake-stub

See also

References

External links