What's behind South Carolina’s recent earthquakes, plus, a cold blast and fire danger in Florida

0:00From AccuWeather.com, this is AccuWeather Daily, a brief host read article, its weather news, and a nutshell. This episode is brought to you by Factor. Get out of your meal run with Factor and kickstart your healthy eating journey. Factor makes it easy with 100 rotating weekly meals designed by dietitians and crafted by chefs. These meals are delicious and super easy to grab and eat because they're ready in about two minutes. There's tons of meal options too, from high protein to calorie smart, Mediterranean diet options, GLP1 support, ready to eat salads, and more. For me, I'm just looking for a little variety throughout the week. So I recently tried Factor's queso, fendido, and ground beef. In two minutes, it was ready, and what I wasn't expecting was the flavor explosion I got. The queso was rich and creamy. The nicely seasoned ground beef, a perfect complement. But don't just take it from me, try Factor for yourself. Go to FactorMeals.com slash AccuWeather50All and use code AccuWeather50All to get 50% off and

1:03free breakfast for a year. Eat like a pro this month with Factor. New subscribers only, very spy plan. One free breakfast item per box for one year while subscription is active. Well, residents of South Carolina have seen a noticeable uptick in seismic activity so far this year, with multiple earthquakes occurring near the Charleston and Low Country region in recent weeks. Residents there are understandably curious about what is going on. Data from the US Geological Survey shows several small quakes clustered near Charleston and adjacent areas in February, you know, with magnitudes mostly between roughly 1.5 and 2.9. One of the strongest this year, a magnitude 2.9 quake on the seventh was felt by many residents followed by a magnitude 2.5 event. The most recent quake happened on the 15th when a magnitude 2.0 was recorded near Ermo. These episodes reflect a string of weak tremors, with nine small earthquakes detected in

2:07the area since January. Although these quakes are felt locally, they are too small to cause any major damage, unlike states on the west coast, where shaking is frequent due to plate boundaries. South Carolina's quakes happen within the interior of the North American tectonic plate. This makes them intraplate earthquakes, quakes that occur away from the plate edges. The state's crust contains ancient fault lines and geologic structures that formed hundreds of millions of years ago during mountain building and continental rifting. Many of these faults lie buried beneath sediments and aren't visible at the surface. Stress slowly builds in the earth's crust over long periods due to tectonic forces, and this stress is released along these older faults, rock breaks, and shifts producing earthquakes. Almost 70% of South Carolina's earthquakes occur in the coastal plain, especially around zones like Ravenel, Hollywood, Middleton, Place, Somerville, and Bowman.

3:10Size-missity in South Carolina is not a new thing. In fact, the 1886 Charleston earthquake estimated between magnitude 7.0 and 7.3 was one of the strongest in eastern US history and caused widespread destruction. While such large events are rare, they show that the region's ancient faults can produce significant quakes. Well, a lot of the focus this week has been on the snowstorm that blanketed the northeast under feet of snow, and rightly so, but Florida's weather is now coming into focus this week as sweeping changes are on the way there. Florida's near-record heat has been swapped by much colder air that moved in this weekend, an ongoing lack of rain, some wind, and dry brush will raise the risk of wildfires once again. Orlando, Jacksonville, and other communities across Northern Florida were close to record highs on Saturday with temperatures climbing well into the 80s. The spotty showers trailing the cold front across Central and Southern Florida this past

4:14weekend did little to ease the dry conditions there. Behind the front, gusty northwest winds ushered in a big cool down and quickly dried out any dampened brush once again. The coldest stretch in the front's wake will occur this morning as temperatures will dip below freezing from north of Orlando into the Florida Panhandle. A light frost is not expected to impact the citrus crop though, and the coldest spots in the early morning acue weather real-field temperatures could dip into the 20s. Dry northwest winds allowed a fire threat to expand across much of Southern Florida. To start out the week, the elevated fire risk came less than a week after a brush fire destroyed a plant nursery in Kassemi, Florida. The use of open flames, power equipment, or anything that might produce sparks or burning embers, is being strongly discouraged this week, an intensifying drought is exacerbating the fire risk. The second highest drought category extreme drought has expanded by 62% across Florida

5:19over the past month. Through February 19th, Jacksonville is experiencing its 18th driest start to the year-on-record with 1.75 inches of rain while Orlando is having the 13th driest start with 1.14 inches. Meanwhile, more than 60% of Louisiana and 23% of Mississippi are in a drought. The Keach Byram drought index, a key indicator of wildfire potential, is high across most of the state and in the very high to extreme category across Southern Florida. The winds will relax by Tuesday, easing the fire threat a bit, but the humidity will remain low, so extra care should still be exercised. Wednesday will be somewhat more humid, which should significantly reduce the fire risk. However, meaningful rain is not expected until later on this week, or possibly the weekend allowing the drought to continue full throttle. The fire risk is not expected to ease anytime soon.

6:19A higher-than-average brush fire risk is expected in Florida throughout this spring, according to AccuWeather's long-range team of meteorologists. That's all for now. You can find more regional forecasts and science-based articles at AccuWeather.com and for your local forecast at your fingertips, download the AccuWeather app. Enjoy the rest of your day. Be safe. I'll be back tomorrow with more from AccuWeather.