This is a totally natural, 100% organic earthquake zone, with a rate of about 1% Oklahoma, and slightly above Toronto. The mechanisms in the East are all the same; essentially they are all water drains. But the wq zone has an added strain rate due to glacial rebound.
Recall that our ice ages are on a 10,000 year cycle because they sink the land like a thumb pressed on a beachball. The ice melts when it hits bottom and then the land rises again. This causes a shear strain rate, the maximum of which is right at the centre of the old ice sheet.
Although the seismic rate is low, the seismic risk is high, since nobody is prepared for earthquakes, and the whole place is infested with goopy clay. Perhaps now people will care about Ottawa because of the election. :) We could easily expect an M6 thrust right under the city, which is the 'everday' earthquake, about 1 in 100 per year. A much larger earthquake is the standard 'city destructor' at 1 in 500. These are the same odds for destroying Toronto, and causing a nuclear disaster. Nearly all 'earthquake cities' live with these odds of destruction, and nobody ever considers an earthquake at these odds. Too bad. :(
**hope -- perhaps with the new guy, we'll have real change. :)
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