Earthquakes

With a full gray beard that spills down onto his chest, all Allan Lindh needs is a flowing white robe to make him look like a guru descended from the mountaintop. It would be in keeping with the visual image if he suddenly began uttering incomprehensible incantations. But instead he is one of the handful of people who can speak lucidly about a subject that has vexed scientists for decades. As chief seismologist at the U.S. Geological Survey's western headquarters in Menlo Park, Calif.

Scientists dissecting the remains of the disastrous 1980 explosion of Mt. St. Helens in Washington state say that crystal formations trapped in volcanic rocks hold important clues about when a magma-loaded mountain is about to blow - a discovery that could help volcanologists make more accurate predictions about future eruptions. The findings, published in Friday's edition of the journal Science, link the movement of underground magma to earthquakes, gas emissions and other warning signs that are more accessible to experts who monitor active volcanoes above ground.

The "Big One" that has been forecast for the San Andreas fault could end up being bigger than earthquake experts previously thought. Recent research showing that a section of the fault is long overdue for a major earthquake has some scientists saying the southern portion of the fault is capable of a magnitude 8.1 earthquake that could run 340 miles from Monterey County to the Salton Sea. That's significantly stronger and longer than the...

Here's one indication how far the Galaxy has fallen since winning the Major League Soccer Cup six months ago: Last year it led the league with 17 shutouts en route to the title. Wednesday it couldn't protect a two-goal lead for 18 minutes, losing to the San Jose Earthquakes, 3-2, at the Home Depot Center. The game-winner came four minutes into stoppage time when second-half substitute Alan Gordon cut in front of Galaxy defenders A.J. DeLaGarza and Sean Franklin and headed a bouncing pass over keeper Brian Perk.

A magnitude 6.5 earthquake rocked the Northern California city of Eureka on Saturday, snapping power lines, toppling chimneys, knocking down traffic signals, shattering windows and prompting the evacuation of at least one apartment building. There were no reports of major injuries, but the temblor, which struck at 4:27 p.m. about 33 miles southwest of the coastal city of 26,000, was powerful enough to send people running into the streets, some fearing a tsunami. Centered offshore about 13 miles deep, the quake was felt as far north as central Oregon, as far south as Santa Cruz and as far east as Reno, the U.S. Geological Survey said.

A magnitude 3.9 earthquake struck a desert area near the Coachella Valley Wednesday afternoon, the U.S. Geological Survey reported. The temblor, which caused no damage or injuries, was centered 11 miles east-northeast of Indio and occurred at 3:47 p.m. Its depth was 5 miles below the surface.

In an attempt to ensure the flow of remittances to devastated Haiti, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano announced Friday that the Obama administration would temporarily grant legal status to the tens of thousands of Haitian immigrants who were living in the United States illegally before this week's earthquake. But Napolitano emphasized that Haitians living in the island nation would not be eligible for temporary protected status, and would be repatriated if they attempted to enter the country, an implicit acknowledgment of the fear, thus far unrealized, that the earthquake could trigger a mass migration of Haitians to U.S. shores.

Expect a far more powerful earthquake than last week's magnitude 7.6 temblor to hit the devastated Indonesian city of Padang and surrounding areas in the next few decades. That's the word from a team of leading seismologists, who said the worst is yet to come, although they cautioned that predicting the timing of earthquakes is an inexact science at best. After a three-day review of seismic evidence using global-positioning equipment, scientists with the Earth Observatory of Singapore, or EOS, found that the Padang earthquake did little to relieve the stored tension at the juncture of two tectonic plates.

With killer tornados, killer hurricanes and killer blizzards back East, it makes California earthquakes seem like a minor inconvenience, somewhere in the category of ants at a picnic. V. FRED RAYSER Yucca Valley

A Chinese activist who sought to document shoddy construction that contributed to deaths in China's devastating 2008 earthquake has been sentenced to five years in prison for subversion, his lawyer said Tuesday. Tan Zuoren was formally accused of inciting subversion of state power in e-mailed comments about the bloody crackdown on June 4, 1989, on pro-democracy demonstrators around Tiananmen Square. But Tan's supporters and Amnesty International say he was detained because he planned to issue an independent report on the collapse of school buildings during the Sichuan earthquake, in which about 70,000 people died.

The magnitude 6.0 earthquake that hit northern Italy early Sunday has claimed the lives of six people and has caused widespread damage. Among the most badly hit sites were a number of cultural heritage structures, according to reports. Italy's cultural ministry said that "after an initial survey, damage to cultural patrimony appears significant. " One of the hardest hit areas was San Felice sul Panaro, a town near Bologna, which saw serious damage to a 14th century castle and to churches that housed valuable paintings and frescoes.

When: 4 Where: Buck Shaw Stadium, San Jose. On the air: TV: Galavision. Records: Chivas USA 3-6, San Jose 7-2-1. Record vs. San Jose: 2-0 (2011) Update: Behind Chris Wondolowski's 11 goals in 10 games, San Jose entered the weekend leading the MLS in scoring (21) and tied for the league lead in wins (7). And with three goals in his last five shots on target, Wondolowski has never been hotter, leaving him on pace to shatter Roy Lassiter's 16-year-old MLS record of 27 goals in a season.

USC safety T.J. McDonald remembers the scrapbook. He saw it at quarterback Matt Barkley's home, a collection of photographs from the Barkley family's trip to Nigeria a few years ago, a journey that included humanitarian work. "I told him I would be interested in going on the next trip when they did something like that," McDonald said Tuesday. McDonald will get his wish next month. Barkley, McDonald and 13 other Trojans are scheduled to travel to Haiti, which continues to rebuild from the devastating 2010 earthquake.

A powerful and prolonged earthquake rocked Mexico on Tuesday, toppling houses near the epicenter in the south, cracking building facades in this sprawling capital and briefly terrifying a population well schooled in natural disasters. Despite the quake's 7.4 magnitude, however, there were no reports of serious injury, according to President Felipe Calderon and officials across the country. Aftershocks rattled the area through the rest of the day. "This is one of the strongest we've ever felt," said Calderon, who urged Mexicans to remain calm.

Malia Obama, President Obama's eldest daughter who is on spring break in Mexico, is safe after a powerful earthquake shook the region this afternoon, First Lady Michelle Obama's office said in a statement. "In light of today's earthquake, we can confirm that Malia Obama is safe and was never in danger," said Kristina Schake, communications director for the first lady. The first daughter, 13, is reportedly traveling in Oaxaca with friends, accompanied by the Secret Service. In commenting on her safety, the White House also reiterated its longstanding request for reporters to "respect the privacy and security of the Obama children and not report on or photograph the girls when they are not with their parents.

She doesn't remember the details of that horrific day one year ago, when she was nearly swallowed alive by a massive tsunami triggered by the largest earthquake in Japan's recorded history. About all Masako Unoura-Tanaka remembers is the cold. Her wet hands. And the words she screamed to her aunt as she slipped into the debris-choked waters while trying to climb to a nearby rooftop for safety: "I don't want to die here! Help me!" Unoura-Tanaka, a Los Angeles resident who was visiting Japan at the time, spoke Sunday in Little Tokyo in downtown Los Angeles, where more than 300 people gathered at three memorial events to burn incense, offer prayers and pay tribute to those who died and those still suffering from the tragedy in northeastern Japan.

The injection of wastewater from natural gas drilling into a disposal well probably caused a dozen earthquakes in Ohio, officials said Friday as they announced new regulations to deal with the issue. The findings about the probable cause of the earthquakes, which occurred in the Youngstown area between March and late December 2011, are likely to intensify an increasingly bitter debate about the safety of hydraulic fracturing in states that sit atop natural gas deposits. Hydraulic fracturing injects sand and water laced with chemicals into the earth at high pressure to break apart shale rock formations and free natural gas trapped inside.