Canie and I attended the Pacific Section AAPG meeting in Long Beach May 21-23. A talk by Jim Boles and a co-author was of interest. An oil well located just offshore U Cal Santa Barbara penetrated a fault just 1 km below the seafloor. They perforated the well at the fault. The pressure at this well fluctuated exactly as the ocean tides, meaning that permeability is very high so that the oil reservoir is in communication with the ocean (there are very large natural oil seeps in this area). Oil production had decreased pressure below hydrostatic, meaning that a partial vacuum is created and the reservoir wants to suck in fluid. I asked whether the decreased fluid pressure due to oil production might have made the faults stronger and explain why there has been little seismicity in Santa Barbara Channel during the last 2 decades compared to the decades before. If this high fault permeability continues down to depths below 5 or 10 km, then lowered pressures would indeed delay seismicity.....

California is getting interesting the last few days-M3 on Garlock fault, M4s at Geysers, south of there, and in Brawley seismic zone south of Salton Sea. Anyone expect anything bigger? Have you got a reason for this if you say you expect something?
Chris