The
Western Australia
Western Australia (WA) is the westernmost state of Australia. It is bounded by the Indian Ocean to the north and west, the Southern Ocean to the south, the Northern Territory to the north-east, and South Australia to the south-east. Western Aust ...
n town of
Meckering was struck by an earthquake on 14 October 1968. The earthquake occurred at , with a moment magnitude of 6.5 and a maximum Mercalli intensity of IX (''Violent''). Total damage amounted to $2.2 million with 20–28 injured.
Earthquake
The shallow fault was about long around the western side of the town of Meckering. It damaged roads including the
Great Eastern Highway
Great Eastern Highway is a road that links the Western Australian capital of Perth with the city of Kalgoorlie. A key route for road vehicles accessing the eastern Wheatbelt (Western Australia), Wheatbelt and the Goldfields-Esperance, Goldfie ...
, the
Eastern Goldfields Railway
The Eastern Goldfields Railway, was built in the 1890s by the Western Australian Government Railways to connect Perth with the Eastern Goldfields at Coolgardie and Kalgoorlie.
It is a part of the interstate standard gauge railway between Per ...
and the
Goldfields water pipeline. It formed a
fault scarp
A fault scarp is a small step-like offset of the ground surface in which one side of a fault has shifted vertically in relation to the other. The topographic expression of fault scarps results from the differential erosion of rocks of contrastin ...
up to high with overthrusting to the west of up to and strike-slip displacement of up to .
[
]
Damage
The earthquake affected structures in Perth
Perth () is the list of Australian capital cities, capital city of Western Australia. It is the list of cities in Australia by population, fourth-most-populous city in Australia, with a population of over 2.3 million within Greater Perth . The ...
, the capital of Western Australia 130 km west of Meckering. It occurred in mid-morning of a public holiday
A public holiday, national holiday, federal holiday, statutory holiday, bank holiday or legal holiday is a holiday generally established by law and is usually a non-working day during the year.
Types
Civic holiday
A ''civic holiday'', also k ...
, the Queen's Birthday
The King's Official Birthday or Queen's Official Birthday is the selected day in most Commonwealth realms on which the birthday of the monarch is officially celebrated in those countries. It does not necessarily correspond to the date of the m ...
and theatres were packed with children.
Salisbury Homestead
The Salisbury Homestead was built by Harry Sermon in 1904 using local stone with a timber and corrigated iron roof. The property would later be owned by the Snooke family. The earthquake destroyed the house, Alice Snooke rescued her 2-year-old daughter from the earthquake. The homestead was abandoned due to the damage and as of 2024 remains as a memorial to the event.
See also
* List of earthquakes in 1968
*List of earthquakes in Australia
This is a list of significant earthquakes recorded in Australia and its territories. The currency used is the Australian dollar (A$) unless noted otherwise.
List of earthquakes
Other earthquakes
*Broome, Western Australia, Broome, 16 August 1 ...
*South West seismic zone
The South West seismic zone (also identified as SWSZ) is a major intraplate earthquake province located in the south west of Western Australia.
It was known earlier as the Yandanooka–Cape Riche Lineament, including the physiographic bounda ...
References
Sources
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External links
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{{Earthquakes in Australia
1968 earthquakes
Earthquakes in Western Australia
Wheatbelt (Western Australia)
1960s in Western Australia