Shake, rattle, roll: Learn about the San Andreas fault

With the recent temblors shaking the world last week, who wouldn’t want to talk to an expert about that big old fault right in our backyard – the San Andreas. Mark Zoback, Ph.D., the Benjamin M. Page Professor of Earth Sciences and Professor of Geophysics at Stanford University, will visit Chapman on Oct. 12 (Monday) to discuss what he’s learned from his drilling experiments along the San Andreas, the most famous and studied fault in the world. Dr. Zoback has literally been drilling into the San Andreas fault near the Central California town of Parkfield. (Yes – that Parkfield, which is famous for its shaker activity. Its town motto is “Be here when it happens.”)
 
Dr. Zoback says he’s trying to answer some long-standing questions about how the San Andreas fault works. With the drilling, he’s been able to pull fault-zone materials from the ground for lab study. And he’s also been part of the push to place an observatory directly within the San Andreas fault to observe what happens before, during and after small earthquakes.
 
His speech is free and open to the public in the Lyon Conference Center, Argyros Forum Room 209C from 2 to 3 p.m.

Not into quakes? Oct. 13 (Tuesday), William K.M. Lau, director of the Laboratory for Atmospheres at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, will talk about air pollution, clouds, rainfall and climate change at 5 p.m. in Hashinger Science Center Room 205. His speech is free and open to the public.

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