Big Island Mystery Booms Amid Earthquake Swarm + Police Scanner Audio - Feb. 22, 2012

http://sheilaaliens.net/?p=300 Police scanner audio starts @ 02:45

""We haven't seen event rates this high or this size of earthquakes become this large since 2006," said Wes Thelen, the US Geological Survey's Seismic Network Director.

The USGS's Hawaiian Volcano Observatory recorded over 60 earthquakes (http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/recenteqsus/Maps/special/Hawaii_e...) strong enough to be located beneath Kilauea, over a dozen of which were greater than a magnitude 2.0; the largest was a magnitude 3.2 earthquake.

"We are still seeing increased rates of seismisity in that area. We just had a magnitude 2.4 come through during the course of this call," Thelen said.

Previous earthquake "swarms" have occurred at this same spot near the boundary between Mauna Loa and Kilauea Volcanos in 1990, 1993, 1997 and 2006.

The USGS received about ten reports from residents who felt Wednesday's swarm.

"I was at home on my computer at about 8:40 and coincidentally I was blogging about the earthquakes that were happening throughout that time, all of a sudden a loud boom and a half-second later, my house shook," said Pahoa resident Damon Tucker.

Damon Tucker was about 30 miles away in Pahoa. However, he's never heard an explosion before an earthquake. He was told Hawaii County Civil Defense said the "boom" cannot be explained."
http://www.khon2.com/news/local/story/Big-Island-booms-have-residents-as...

Scanner audio courtesy of the archives at http://www.radioreference.com

Timelapse footage from Feb. 22 courtesy of CFHT in Hilo, Hawaii:
http://www.cfht.hawaii.edu/webcams/

Puna forum discussing the booms:
http://punaweb.org/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=14002&whichpage=1