Earthquake in Yellowknife?

I guess so, maybe not. After hearing about it all day on Saturday I guess it was true. My first thoughts were blasting, as I’m sure everyone’s were. I even caught wind of someone saying they were blasting in front of the Multiplex. For those who are not in Yellowknife or are new, blasting the rock in the area is very common up here when doing construction of any manor.

It happened at approximately 11:08am on Saturday morning off the shore of Great Slave Lake. According to Natural Resources Canada it was a quake with a magnitude of 1.0ml just 6km south of Yellowknife. This is nothing to be proud of but a decent one for Yellowknife.

If memory serves me correctly, which occasionally it does, this is the 3rd earthquake around Yellowknife in the past 20 years or so. I can remember people talking about one that happened in the middle of the night that woke them up. And a second one during the day, where people reported feeling it up the NorthwesTel Building. (I could be wrong though)

It is very common for Yellowknifers to mistake a earthquakes for blasting, because blasting just happens so much more often. Although there was one time about 4 years ago that an earthquake was mistaken as blasting. It was when the highway to Rae was still being worked on and they were using more explosives than normal. So when it went off it gave off a lot more grumbling than normal.

UPDATE: So what was blasting, was an earthquake is now again Blasting. What Yellowknife felt was a larger than normal blast from Con mine. From CBC North

Mine manager Scott Stringer told CBC News on Monday that Saturday’s blast had been scheduled for last Thursday, but was delayed twice because of weather.

“It was a fairly large blast. We used about 15,000 kilograms of explosives,” Stringer said.

Stringer said workers involved with the blast had notified the authorities a day in advance, including the mine inspector, the local airport and Natural Resources Canada.

More blasting work will take place at the site until Dec. 15. Stringer said he is looking at ways to better warn Yellowknifers in advance of the upcoming blasts.

Natural Resources Canada later updated its online report of the “earthquake” incident to say it was a blast for a water treatment plant.

This has been an odd story at the, but surely someone from the mine could have stepped forward sooner and explained what was really going on at 11:08 Saturday morning.