‘Stress has been building up’: 2.5 magnitude earthquake recorded near Basalt

Geoscience Australia wants to know if you felt this magnitude 2.5 earthquake at 11am Saturday, which they recorded near Townsville’s military training area. Coincidence? We asked the experts.

2.5 magnitude earthquake recorded north of Charters Towers at 11.13am, September 14, 2024.

A section of cattle station country between Charters Towers and Herveys Range recorded a 2.5 magnitude earthquake on Saturday, 11.13am.

The quake was picked up by Geoscience Australia by instruments located in Charters Towers, Townsville, Bowen, and even registered on recording devices as far as Cairns and Mount Isa.

The quake apparently occurred at a depth of 9km, on Valre Station.

Eagle-eyed readers might notice that the army’s field training area is close by, so we asked the experts how confident they were that the little quake was caused by mother nature.

Geoscience Australia senior seismologist Jonathan Bathgate said their instruments do pick up mine blasts and things of that nature, but those are only so powerful.

“It gets to a certain point where they are large enough that you can say it’s definitely an earthquake,” Mr Bathgate said.

2.5 magnitude earthquake recorded north of Charters Towers at 11.13am, September 14, 2024.

“There is not a great deal of seismic activity historically in that area, but there are some earthquakes on record.”

This includes a 4.1 quake in 1971 south of Charters Towers and a 5.7 earthquake between Charters Towers and Bowen in 1931.

2.5 magnitude earthquake recorded north of Charters Towers at 11.13am, September 14, 2024.

The cause of this little 2024 rumble was “background stress” that builds up underneath Australia as the landmass moves north by seven centimetres each year, Mr Bathgate said.

“Stress has been building up there, and it’s just released that (with an earthquake),” the seismologist said.

“Australia is littered with fault lines, most of them we don’t know exist because they haven’t moved since we started recordings about 100 years ago.”

Anyone who experienced the quake is urged to report what they felt to Geoscience Australia via a ‘felt report’ at https://earthquakes.ga.gov.au/

Originally published as ‘Stress has been building up’: 2.5 magnitude earthquake recorded near Basalt