英语翻译Scientists have made themselves a front-row seat in the

英语翻译
Scientists have made themselves a front-row seat in the theater of earthquakes.Drilling was completed on an
8.5-inch-wide hole that goes more than 2 miles into an active seismic zone of San Andreas Fault at Parkfield,
Calif,where samll earthquakes-about magnitude 2.0-occur every two years.This 800-mile hole through California
is the boundary between two moving parts of Earth's crust.Parkfield is a tiny town well known for its earthquakes.
"As we were drilling,all of a sudden the drill rate jumped and all this gas started to come up,which gave us
an indication that we were going through a fault zone,"Gregory van der Vink says.
Scientists will palce sensitive instruments deep into the hole to collect data,including fluid pressure,
temperature and geophysical measurements,as small quakes develop and progress.This will help them understand the
fundamental physics at play and predict larger,more devastating earthquakes.
In addition to the instrument measurements,researchers collected material from the hole to study the composition
of the fault zone.They will collect additional core samples starting in 2007.Scientists also hope to learn more
about the role earthquakes played in assembling North America.At San Andreas,the Pacific and North American plates
press against each other,moving about 2 inches in a year.
"The project is going to have a profound influence,"says Zoback,one of the principal SAFOD investigators."We
are opening a door to new areas of research that will pay off over time.We'll be learning things for months and
years to come."