An intriguing little earthquake from the south of the county this morning, a magnitude 1.3 tremor southwest of Gnosall (west of Stafford). This is the recording from Keele University.
The region is underlain by Mercia Mudstone so it could be salt collapse related, but most of the salt extraction is the other side of Stafford. Nearby is the enigmatically named “Coal Pit Bank Coverts” but there are no mines to my knowledge at the ‘pit’ is almost certainly a ‘marl-hole’ (marl being spread on the local fields to aid agriculture).
The ‘quake does lie between the epicentres of the Dudley 2002 M4.7 and the Stafford 1916 M4.6 earthquakes so could be related to a structure running north-south between the two, possibly an extension of the Malvern Line, but this event has been located very shallow by the BGS where as the larger events were at about 10km down.
Update: The BGS in their infinite wisdom have relocated the event to northeast of Gnosall and upped the magnitude to 1.4. However, the geology is broadly similar and most of the above comments still hold.
View Gnosall Quake in a larger map
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