Woke this morning to the news of Japan’s devastating earthquake.

Just yesterday, by weird coincidence, I heard a story about “unexplained earthquakes in Arkansas, on a fault where natural gas companies are drilling.”   Since I heard this story reported on NPR,  even conservative Fox news has mentioned it.  In the initial phase (“questions are being asked” + “looking for a connection between injection drilling and earthquake clusters”) nobody wanted to stop the drilling companies but now the state of Arkansas has issued a temporary moratorium on INJECTION DRILLING (bravo!) — the process by which the natural gas drilling companies get rid of their waste water, contaminated as it is with a complicated cocktail of known carcinogens and myriad other chemicals, by forcibly injecting it deep underground. Bizarre and terrifying— water quality impacts alone should prohibit such practices, much less the emerging seismic implications. Anyone who sees the documentary GASLAND will gain terrible insight into exactly how this is being done.

Earthquake activity in Arkansas gaining national attention ¬´ Protecting Our Waters.

Geologists say fault in central Ark., site of hundreds of earthquakes, is longer than thought.

See also:

NPR: Arkansas Cities Feel Unexplained Surge in Earthquakes.

NPR: Sparks fly over Gasland Drilling Documentary .