New, interactive map shows Sonoma County's earthquake fault zones

Do you know if your home is in an earthquake fault zone? It's now easier than ever to find out the information, thanks to a new, easy-to-navigate interactive map published by the California Geological Survey.

Simply type in your address or share your location via your smartphone to to find out where you stand.

Having access to this information is crucial for homeowners and renters. As Tim McCrink, supervising engineering geologist and program manager for seismic hazards for the California Geological Survey told the Los Angeles Times, "When the ground breaks under an existing building, there's a higher chance that the building will collapse."

The map also includes features to check if a location is at risk of liquefaction or a landslide triggered by an earthquake. Liquefaction refers to the process by which water-saturated, unconsolidated sediments are transformed into a substance that acts like a liquid due to stress from earthquake activities.

While the map shows that most Sonoma County zoned parcels have not been evaluated for seismic landslide or liquefaction hazards, the parcels highlighted in yellow show the homes and businesses that lie within an earthquake fault zone.

Most earthquake fault zones serve as a general guide of a broader area where potential hazards can exist, meaning that every parcel located within a highlighted area is not necessarily at risk for sinking into the ground should an earthquake hit. "The area where the ground actually fails in a particular earthquake may be only a small proportion of the total area in the zone," McCrink told the newspaper.

A fault zone stretching from Marin County, through Petaluma and Santa Rosa, and up to Windsor is visible on the map. The map also shows that nearly all of the Bodega Bay area lies within a fault zone.

The Alquist-Priolo Earthquake Fault Zoning Act in 1972 and the Seismic Hazards Mapping Act in 1990 were established to delineate regulatory "zones of investigation" for the protection of public safety, publishing maps and creating PDF files for public access. However, the online map is the first of its kind when searching for potential earthquake hazards.