"It's really unprecedented to see this level of quiet," said Cassidy, who is also an adjunct professor at the University of Victoria. Many of Canada's seismology stations are not in big cities on purpose, to reduce the noise pollution all the time. In big cities that are considered high-risk earthquake zones, like Los Angeles, the data is particularly useful. Canada normally records between 4,000 and 5,000 earthquakes a year, most of them on the smaller scale and not felt by people. Cassidy says that won't help predict future big earthquakes yet but will be useful in helping engineers create better building codes for earthquake-prone regions.

Source: CBC News April 14, 2020 13:03 UTC