Big One WILL hit California soon as huge earthquake rattles Mexico, scientist warns

CALIFORNIA could be in for a huge earthquake as a scientist warns the the potentially catastrophic San Andreas fault could be about to rupture following deadly tremors in Mexico.

In the days following the powerful 7.1 quake in Mexico City which killed more than 200 people, California was also hit by a handful of smaller tremors – with the most powerful registering at 3.2.

Beneath California, the Pacific and North American tectonic plates are moving northward – although the former is moving quicker leading to a build up of tension.

A powerful earthquake in 1857 released some of this pressure, but a lot more needs to be released, and Robert Graves, a research geophysicist at the US Geological Survey (USGS), suggests the Big One could be overdue by ten years.

He told Raw Story: "The San Andreas fault in southern California last had a major quake in 1857 (magnitude 7.9).

"Studies that have dated previous major offsets along the fault trace show that there have been about 10 major quakes over the past 1,000-2,000 years… the average time between these quakes is about 100-150 years.”

Although Mexico City and California are not on the same fault lines, Matthew Blackett, a senior lecturer in physical geography and natural hazards at Coventry University said it is a similar system and could be a sign of things to come.

He said: "It's a different system.

"But the system that is causing these quakes in Mexico is by and large similar to what's happening in California.”

However, John Bellini, a fellow geophysicist at USGS, moved to calm fears and said that not all smaller quakes are a sign that the Big One is coming.

He said: "It looks like normal activity; they're all over the place.

"We can't predict or forecast earthquakes."

"Sometimes before a large earthquake you'll have a foreshock or two, but we don't know they're foreshocks until the big one happens.”

California was rocked by 28 tremors in just 24 hours on Sunday, sparking fears a “big one” could roar across the US state.

And now experts warn the chance of a magnitude 8 quake, or larger, striking in the next 30 years has doubled since 2008.

The potential quake would cripple the city’s water supply and take up to six months to repair.

The Mayor of Los Angeles’s special seismic advisor, seismologist Dr Lucy Jones, said: “Such disruption to our water system, it’ll take up to 6 months to get the water back into our homes.”