Major earthquake shakes rural Alaska

ANCHORAGE, Alaska -- A major earthquake rocked a sparsely populated area of interior Alaska early Sunday afternoon, damaging supports to the trans-Alaska oil pipeline and opening 6-foot cracks in highways and roads.

The magnitude 7.9 quake, centered 90 miles south of Fairbanks, was strongly felt in Anchorage about 270 miles to the south. It hit at 1:13 p.m. Alaska Standard Time, said Bruce Turner of the West Coast and Alaska Tsunami Warning Center.

"It shook for a good 30 seconds," Turner said.

Only one injury was reported: A 76-year-old woman in Mentasta broke her arm after slipping on stairs, State Trooper Greg Wilkinson said.

Support structures were damaged on the trans-Alaska oil pipeline, but the pipeline itself was intact, said Mike Heatwole, spokesman for the Alyeska Pipeline Service Co.

The quake triggered a detection system, and operators manually shut down the pipeline about 2 p.m., Heatwole said.

In five locations, vertical support members, the H-shape devises that hold the aboveground portions of the pipeline, were damaged. In eight locations, the "shoes" that connect the pipeline to the vertical support members were on the ground, leaving the pipeline suspended, Heatwole said.

Repair crews were working to reduce stress on the pipeline.

Heatwole said company officials should may know by mid morning Monday how long it will take to restart the pipeline.

The earthquake occurred on the Denali Fault at a shallow depth, said John Lahr, geophysicist at the U.S. Geological Survey's National Earthquake Information Center in Golden, Colo. Shallow earthquakes generally are felt over a wider area.

Numerous roads developed wide cracks, including the Alaska Highway near Northway, 256 miles southeast of Fairbanks.

The Richardson Highway, which parallels the trans-Alaska pipeline between Valdez and Fairbanks, was closed near Paxson after gaps opened that were up to 6 feet wide and 5 feet deep, Wilkinson said.

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