Up to 15% chance of a major earthquake hitting B.C. area over next 50 years

There is a 10-15% of a mega-earthquake hitting the northern segment of the Cascadia Subduction Zone at some point during the next 50 years, according to research from Oregon State University.
The northern segment of the Cascadia Subduction Zone covers an area from Vancouver Island, B.C. to Seaside, Oregon.
On the other hand, a 37% chance exists that a major earthquake will strike the southern end of the Cascadia Subduction Zone – from Newport, Oregan to northern California.
Researchers at the university found Cascadia is essentially made up of at least four segments, and earthquake activity varies from segment to segment.
“The largest earthquakes occur in the north and usually rupture the entire fault,” said Chris Goldfinger, a marine geologist at Oregon State University.
“These are quakes of about Magnitude 9, and they are just huge,” he said. “But they don’t happen as frequently.”
“At the southern end of the fault, the earthquakes tend to be a bit smaller, but more frequent,” he added. “These are still Magnitude 8 or greater events, which is similar to what took place in Chile, so the potential for damage is quite real.”
“Perhaps more striking than the probability numbers is that we can now say that we have already gone longer without an earthquake than 75% of the known times between earthquakes in the last 10,000 years,” Goldfinger said. “And 50 years from now, that number will rise to 85%.”