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Show 1 ''-' A LAND OF UNCERTAINTIES r ffVftmmentexPte who have studied the extent of the earthquake m Alaska which occurred at Yakutat bay in September g899, class it as one of the ten greatest' earthquakes of historic EST d- Predict th0r 8eiBmi? di8tuianceS that region similar p the Fairbanks tremors of last month. P In the Yakutat disturbance, the area of greatest intensity lay ' I along the flanks of the St Elias range, in a region of high moun- Itama and superb glaciers, and the movement was accompanied by 5H?2fiaaancnB arid rock glides. This is a vivid demonstra- tion that the growth of mountains is still in progress. At some places in the region the land ""subsided and forests wore submrged Almost places, howover, the land rose, and mnuy points' which before be-fore had lain below sea level were elevated above it. " Barnacles wh'ich had" lived in sea water were found forty-seven feet above sea level. The shock was felt at distances of G70 and 1,200 miles in opposite oppo-site directions from Yakutat ba', and' the area of the region' over J which the tremblings were felt is. more than 1,500,000 square miles. This gives tho Yakutat bay earthquake a place among the very greatest earthquakes of historic times. The other great shocks, without exception, resulted in heavy loss of life, the number of persons per-sons killed reaching in one of them the great total of 60,000. The Yakutat bay shock was free from fatalities, not because it was less severo, but on account of the sparsely settled character of the region' re-gion' in which it occurred. Tho volcanic outbreaks along the Alaskan archipelago and the earthquakes on the mainland prove that muoh of the southwest part of the territory is a danger zone from which some day we may expect to hear of a great disaster. . |