Southern San Andreas

According to [this article in the New Scientist](http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg19025574.800-quake-fears-haunt-southern-california.html)
> A new study, by geophysicist Yuri Fialko of the University of California, San Diego, [shows that] deep within the Earth’s crust, the west side of the San Andreas fault has moved relative to the east by as much as 8 metres since the region’s last earthquake. But closer to the surface, the two sides of the fault are jammed against each other, building up ever-increasing strain.

> Fialko says that this 8-metre shift is on a par with the maximum movement that the fault has ever experienced between quakes – and it has packed enough energy in the fault to unleash a magnitude-8 earthquake if the strain were released all at once. “If it’s realised, it’s going to be a major disaster,” he says.

This looks like [yet another advance on measuring earthquakes](http://www.rerisk.net/?p=44), though it would be even better of course to be able to predict them with some greater accuracy. However, when you consider [the degree of apathy](http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/20/science/earth/20sea.html?pagewanted=1&ei=5087%0A&en=b9c8ca9658749351&ex=1151035200) that people have about moving out of the way of hurricanes and rising sea-levels, it makes you question whether it would dissuade them from building on or near major faultlines.