Seismologist says Pak quake island unlikely to last long

A seismologist has observed that the small island like structure formed as a result of 7.7-magnitude earthquake that struck Balochistan's Awaran district, is unlikely to last long.

Tuesday's earthquake killed at least 271 people and the dark grey mass of rock and mud emerged from the waves in the Arabian Sea, resembling an island.

A marine biologist from Pakistan's National Institute of Oceanography, Mohammad Danish said that his team of experts found methane gas rising from the 60 to 70 feet high, up to 300-feet wide and up to 120-feet long island.

According to the Daily Times, a seismologist with Australia's University of Melbourne, Gary Gibson said that the new island was likely to be a 'mud volcano', created by methane gas forcing material upwards during the violent shaking of the earthquake.

Gibson said that the so-called island is not a fixed structure but a body of mud that will be broken down by wave activity and dispersed over time.

He further said that the temporary island was very different from the permanent uplift seen during major 'subduction zone' earthquakes, where plate collisions force the Earth's crust suddenly and sometimes dramatically upwards.

During the 1960, a massive 9.5-magnitude earthquake hit Chile, known as the world's largest ever, the whole fishing villages were thrust 'several metres' upwards and wharves were suddenly located hundreds of metres inland, the report added.