Every earthquake felt in Canada from 1985

While many on B.C.'s South Coast were joltedout of their beds on Dec. 29 by a magnitude 4.8 earthquake, it certainly wasn't unusual.

In fact, it was one of 300 earthquakes of magnitude 4 and higherthat have been felt in Canada since 1985 to Dec. 31, 2015.

CBC has mapped all those earthquakes, using theseismic bulletin data from theNational Earthquake Database.

Click the playbutton to start the animation.

Once thetimelapseends, click on individual bubbles to see more detailed information about that earthquake. The larger the bubble, the greater the magnitude of the earthquake.

Where the earthquakes are felt

The majority of the earthquakes in Canada occur off the West Coast where twotectonic plates the Juan de Fuca plateand the Pacific Ocean plate clash with the North American plate upon which Canadarests.

However the earthquakes in Ontario and Quebecare of a different variety, says CBCmeteorologistand seismologistJohannaWagstaffe.

Unlike the pushing and clashing of the tectonic plates on the West Coast, the eastern quakes areusually the result of old, reactivated faults or elastic rebound of the earth from the Ice Age.

Wagstaffeadded that an earthquake in eastern Canada would be felt much further than its epicentre compared to earthquakes in B.C., because the Canadian shield does not dampen the effect of the tremors.

The Big One

Scientists have been warning that amassive megathrust earthquake could strike B.C. at any time.

Predicting earthquakes is a difficult proposition atthe best of times, but British Columbia is particularly challenging with the extensive network of fault lines that spread like a matrix across the province.

This is what the fault lineslook like mapped across the province.