Seismic Activity
In 1356, the Basel earthquake occurred in the Rhine Plain. It was perhaps the most destructive earthquake ever to have occurred in northwest Europe, destroying the city of Basel and flattening buildings as far as 200 km away. The epicentre of the most significant historic seismological event to have occurred in Central Europe, was located between Waldkirch and St. Peter in Breisgau-Hochschwarzwald. However, it remains disputed whether the fault that ruptured to cause this earthquake was indeed part of the Rhine Valley extensional system, or simply one of the many thrust faults that make up the Alps to the south. Doubts have been raised over the adequacy of the seismic evaluation and design of the Fessenheim Nuclear Power Plant, built in the Rhine Plain close to the faults.
Read more about this topic: Upper Rhine Plain
Famous quotes containing the words seismic and/or activity:
“Most near, most dear, most loved and most far,
Under the window where I often found her
Sitting as huge as Asia, seismic with laughter,”
—George Barker (b. 1913)
“A worm is as good a traveler as a grasshopper or a cricket, and a much wiser settler. With all their activity these do not hop away from drought nor forward to summer. We do not avoid evil by fleeing before it, but by rising above or diving below its plane; as the worm escapes drought and frost by boring a few inches deeper.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)