This week we have a TPL Kids website visitor who may have been watching the news lately and wondered why earthquakes happen.
For this wonder, we’ve found an answer from the US Geological Survey:
An earthquake is caused by a sudden slip on a fault. The tectonic plates are always slowly moving, but they get stuck at their edges due to friction. When the stress on the edge overcomes the friction, there is an earthquake that releases energy in waves that travel through the earth's crust and cause the shaking that we feel.
Luckily in Toronto earthquakes are a rare occurance.