L.A. Chronicle/January 13th, 2006

From Los Angeles Wiki

Commerce Booms in Vernon by Charles Portman, Staff Writer

True, our unemployment rate is down recently, but that's not the source of these Commerce booms. In the late 80's there were a series of what sounded like underground explosions in the City of Commerce, near Gage and Zindell. Dubbed the "Commerce Booms", no real explainations were ever found for them, and they faded away rather quickly. Last night, at 3 am, the Booms returned, but they had shifted position, now occuring just at the edge of the L.A. River, in Vernon. A series of 4 booms were reported by night watchmen in the area. "I throught it was a sonic boom, you know, like from an airplane, " reported Carlos Alagao, security guard for Telmark Shipping, which operates out of Vernon. However, both the Air Force and tower at L.A.X. have confirmed that no airplanes at all, much less supersonic jets were in the area at the time. Vernon city officials have rejected the possibility of underground gas explosions, as all of the gas lines in the area are functioning, and investigations of the sewers have show no evidence of explosions.

A recent theory however, has been posed by a group of seismologists with Cal Tech. They surmise that these booms are the result of "Micro-earthquakes", tiny localised settlings of large underground structures. They have set up equipment in the area, hoping to catch the next set of booms in action, to record the activity, to better understand the phenomenon.