A new geological study reveals that the Salt Lake Temple is located directly above the Wasatch fault line, which runs through the center of Temple Square, making it more vulnerable to earthquake damage than previously understood. The fault line extends under both the Salt Lake Temple and Conference Center, and scientists have discovered that two active fault lines appear to connect under downtown Salt Lake City, potentially causing more damage than previously thought. Utah is believed to have a 50% risk of a large damaging earthquake along the Wasatch front within 50 years. This geological hazard parallels the spiritual foundation theme in President Nelson's 2021 General Conference talk, where he compared the temple renovations to strengthening our spiritual foundations to withstand forthcoming perils and pressures.
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Directly Underneath the 'Middle' of the Salt Lake Temple, Then It Gets Even WorseAdded:
Hi everybody. Welcome to Christian Homestead. My name is Jared. I got an email from Kevin H. Subject line, earthquake fault under the Salt Lake Temple. Yes. And then in the email, "Hi Jared, I'm still watching your video about the Salt Lake Temple today and wondered if he knew this. There's a fault line that goes directly underneath the Salt Lake Temple and Conference Center. Apparently, it is part of the Wasatch fault which has several segments. I would recommend reading this Wikipedia article as it may have some concerning information for your viewers in your area.
Thank you for the email. Um, just to clarify, I'm not in that area. I'm in Missouri. Uh, but I am from the Salt Lake Valley originally.
I grew up uh hearing about and being warned about the big one that would happen someday.
Uh and I did not know this. And thanks to this email, it led me to something else that I didn't know that makes the situation even worse.
So, we're going to go ahead and dive into this. Before we do, just really quick, a few days ago, I did a live stream because I received this in the mail. Uh, somebody had attended my friend Troy's funeral. Uh, he was the host of the last dispensation YouTube channel. He passed away in January.
And I had a few more memories that I wanted to share. And, you know, since I got this in the mail, I thought it was fitting just to do a a quick live stream. Um, I shared what Troy sent me in his LA in like the last text that he sent me. Uh, it was a video which during the live stream I realized it was actually there was probably more meaning behind it than what I realized. So, I'll put the link for the live stream in the description box below in case you haven't seen it. But when I did the live stream, I checked the GoFundMe and it's still up and they haven't quite met the goal. They're at 90%. So, please consider donating if you can, especially if you um were a fan of Troy's if you haven't been able to yet. Uh it made me think really really quick of this scripture. Uh James chapter 1 27 pure religion and undefiled before God in the father is this to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction and to keep himself unspotted from the world.
So, uh, if you can please donate to, uh, Troy's family that he left behind. You know, I I'm doing this because I would definitely want him to do this for me if I had been the one to have passed away first. Um, so please donate and at the very least say a prayer uh for his family.
Okay, so we're going to go to a couple websites to take a look at this. The first one is the USGS website.
And uh there it is right there. This yellow line. You see one over here uh that goes through the family history center. Um, but if you come over here to Temple Square, it goes right down the middle basically.
Um, I mean, not perfectly, but it basically cuts the temple in half as viewed from from above.
Um, it nearly goes over like the center point, which would be about right here or so.
That's stunning to me. I didn't know about this. Again, I grew up in Salt Lake, specifically in Murray. That's my hometown. And I always heard about the big one, and that there was a a big fault line along the Wasatch front. And if we zoom out, uh, you can see that I'm assuming that what most people, uh, have been referring to is like this right here, cuz I I seem to remember when I was like in Young Men's.
We were going to like one time do an activity where we would go to where the fault line was because I don't know if it's like marked somewhere or if there's like a trail or something.
I can't remember what it was, but one of my young men's leaders was going to take us to go see something having to do with the fault line. And I think it was it was like along here um on like the east side of the valley. But you can see there's a bunch of other orange lines.
And this one right here, um, it looks like it, these two lines that we were that we were looking at before, they connect up here north of downtown.
But when you zoom in and look at the one on the east, right through the Salt Lake Temple, and then if you follow it up, follow it up across the street, across North Temple. Uh, yeah, it goes underneath the conference center, too.
So, I mean, just think about that. It doesn't go through the Salt Lake Tabernacle. It doesn't go through the Assembly Hall. Um, this map still shows the North Visitor Center. That's not there anymore. Uh, it doesn't go under, you know, the Joseph Smith Memorial Building, the church office building, the administration building. No, it goes through or under directly under the Salt Lake Temple. This is This is a new thing to me. I I had no idea. Um for some reason they don't they don't depict it here.
This is Let's see. Let me go to home.
Geolog geologic hazards portal by the Utah Geological Survey.
Um I don't know why they don't show on theirs.
So right here is the Salt Lake Temple.
Um, they have these buildings kind of like they kind of look 3D as you move the map around. So hopefully you can see that the Salt Lake Temple, but you don't have an orange line, but you have that the other line uh that goes through the family history library and church history museum.
Uh, you scroll out. Now, I don't know why there's a discrepancy between the two. Uh maybe the USGS is more detailed with their map. I don't know.
Uh it looks like you kind of have the beginning of it right here. Maybe if you go up north just a little bit. Um but you zoom out and it shows you like the the danger zones for Utah. It's pretty self-explanatory.
you probably don't want to be in the red area when there's an earthquake uh around there. So, and the thing about it is um okay, so you have Salt Lake City and the metro area and I think technically according to uh like the US census it encompasses like the Salt Lake Valley mostly like the metro area of Salt Lake but in in in technically I think the Provo area is another metro area and then Ogden is a third metro area according to the census. Um, but in my mind, you know, being from Salt Lake, I've always thought as the entire thing from Ogden all the way down to, you know, a little bit past Probo, basically Utah Valley, Utah Valley, Salt Lake Valley, and then going on up to Ogden as like one big metro area.
It it's interesting because, you know, you have this similarity between Salt Lake City and Jerusalem where if I was to turn the map upside down, uh Salt Lake City is basically it's like relatively in the same position that Jerusalem is when compared to the Great Salt Lake and the Dead Sea. I've done videos about that before. Many people have noted that similarity. you have a a river Jordan that connects these two salt lakes or dead seas uh to a large to to another uh fresh lake. In the case of, you know, Israel, you have the Sea of Galilee. In Utah, you have Utah Lake and they're connected um with the River Jordan or the Jordan River.
Um, and another similarity between Salt Lake and Jerusalem is that, you know, you have Israel, which is like an up and down type country. Um, it's not wide, it's not circular, it's it's up and down. And so, you have something kind of similar happening here, uh, along the Wasatch front, but earthquakes.
So, it's kind of it's kind of stunning. And it makes you think, especially with the renovations of the Salt Lake Temple.
Um, in fact, why don't we go to that really quick? Let's remind ourselves of what President Nelson said. This is the October 2021 general conference, the temple and your spiritual foundation.
Um, I'm recording this on the 6th.
Earlier today, I posted what I think is an interesting video about how I think that the beginning of the renovation of the Salt Lake Temple maybe began a period of trials for the church to prepare us for the second coming to help us live a higher, holier way to get rid of the old debris. Uh what President Nelson also referred to as our favorite sins. I think sometimes we have to go through really difficult trials maybe to get to a point where we're willing where we're willing to acknowledge that we have a problem or there's things that we need to take care of.
Um and so there was like one big year of trials for the whole world in 2020 when the renovations project began. And I was comparing the architecture of the Solici temple to a type of timeline. how if you start on this side, you have like a big spike like one of these towers or like the towers on one side would represent 2020 and then you have the years in between and now in like 2025, 2026 perhaps another big spike in trials. And I I just noted that there's been a lot of focus lately on trials in general conference and social media posts and the uh 2026 BYU women's conference and then just seeing it in my own life uh me and my family but also my friends and family feels like something's going on.
So like it it kind of feels like there's these two big years of trials and it's meant to prepare us. It's meant to strengthen us. It's meant to, you know, repair us to um prepare us essentially for the millennium.
Uh that's what President Nelson said here is, you know, he was talking about repairing and uh fixing up the solici temple, a foundation that will withstand the forces of nature into the millennium.
And I think he's comparing the Salt Lake Temple to us. I know that he is. He says it right here. Um, these are the latter days. If you and I are are to withstand the forthcoming perils and pressures, it is imperative that we each have a firm spiritual foundation.
So, I think that something's going on.
But toward the end of this talk, um he says, "My dear brothers and sisters, when renovations on the Salt Lake Temple are completed and for you and me in our personal lives after we go through these trials that seem to be going on right now from 2020 until now and with the Salt Lake Temple about to be rededicated next year.
So think of it like in that sense, my dear brothers and sisters, when when renovations on the Salt Lake Temple and you are completed, there will be no safer place during an earthquake in the Salt Lake Valley than inside that temple. Likewise, whenever any kind of upheaval occurs in your life, the safest place to be spiritually is living inside your temple covenants.
So, it's an interesting thing going on. I think there's a parallel between the SI temple and us and the Lord preparing us for possibly hard times ahead uh and or the second coming itself.
Okay. Now, I did a video a while ago. Let's see when was this. Uh May 22nd of last year. came across a post on X by Mario Nefal.
Salt Lake City is on an is on a Quake time bomb. And he referenced a Scitec daily article which we're going to go to.
And the the name of the article is the next earthquake is long overdue. New research reveals Wasatch fault more dangerous than previously believed.
I'm not going to go over this again. I'm just going to show you the highlights.
Uh this has to do with a new discovery or like new observations that relate to the the dip angle of the sliding surface. How I guess like the the angle matters when it comes to these fault lines, which makes sense. They noted what happened in 2020 with uh the Magna earthquake. So, if you're not familiar with Salt Lake, let's go back here.
So, you know, here's downtown Salt Lake City right here. And if you go over here to the west part of the valley, uh here's Magna. I don't know exactly where the epicenter was, but it was like somewhere over here. There was an earthquake over here that was strong enough to make the angel angel Moroni of the Salt Lake Temple drop his trumpet.
So with that earthquake that happened at the same time as the pandemic was starting to really spread across the United States, they discovered with that earthquake that uh it was at a a shallow depth and it made them rethink the I guess geological situation of the Salt Lake Valley and how it's like oh my gosh, look what happened with the Magna earthquake.
Uh, it may not quite be what we thought with these slip angles.
Um, and then it says, "Communities along the fault are more vulnerable to earthquake damage than previously thought."
Okay.
Well, I'm glad I don't live in Salt Lake anymore. Um, I pray for all of you.
Hopefully, you have emergencies emergency supplies. I mean we all should but please really take this seriously especially since the church has renovated the solici temple for such an event and at the very least we know that there is going to be a great earthquake that affects the entire world um when Christ comes and he sets foot on the Mount of Olives. It may be worse in Salt Lake because of the fault lines. I don't know how that's going to go, but if you live along the Wasatch front, you should probably be a little bit more alert when it comes to earthquakes and prepared. But then I came across this as I was preparing for this video. I didn't know this. So, this article that we just read, again, that was from last year, May 2025.
Um, I came across this which was from four years before that.
So, this is Fox 13.
New geological study shows fault lines meeting under Salt Lake City.
Now, I don't know I don't know if it's like the same fault lines as what we were looking at, like the fault line that goes directly underneath the Salt Lake Temple, but it says two active fault lines appear to connect under downtown Salt Lake City. According to a newly published geological study, scientists believe they have the potential to cause more damage than previously thought.
Utah is believed to have a 50% risk of a large damaging earthquake along the Wasatch front in 50 years.
Um, so these are two situations, the slip angle, um, and then the two fault lines meeting under Salt Lake City that make the situation more dangerous than previously thought.
Um, let's go back to this map. I just want to see really quick if we can see what fault lines they're talking about that meet under Salt Lake. Are are they talking about I mean there's this that meets up here and meets down here. It's kind of the like the east side of the city. Um, these two meet up here north of downtown.
I don't know which other ones meet or if it if it's even uh depicted on this. I I don't know.
I don't know.
But when they say that they meet under Salt Lake City, I think that they they actually mean the city limits of Salt Lake City rather than the whole Salt Lake Valley. So that kind of puts, you know, church headquarters more um in the danger zone if that's the case.
Okay. Well, I decided to add the words earthquake and earthquakes to my spreadsheet called timeline phrases.
This is the tally of general conference talks by year that include these words and phrases. So for example, the word earthquakes showed up in one general conference talk in 2025.
We have searched many many different words and phrases and this has been a very enlightening spreadsheet and exercise.
Well, let's take a look and see if we can find any patterns. And right off the bat, you see some of these darker colors for earthquake and earthquakes in 2020, in 2021, and you could even say 2022, but definitely in 2020.
Uh, let me give you a sampling of one talk that brought one of these words up.
This is another L. Whitney Clayton of the Presidency of the 70, April 2020 general conference.
So, just a month after that earthquake affected the Salt Lake Temple, he said, "The church has commenced a 4-year restoration project to improve the temple's structural and seismic strength." And then there's a footnote.
Let's take a look at that. An earthquake on March 18th, 2020 amply demonstrated the need to undertake the project.
Again, if we liken this to ourselves, if if we think about that earthquake being a message from the Lord, not just for the temple and how the temple needs to be renovated, but for us like this earthquake being a message to us that we need to guard ourselves, uh upgrade ourselves, renovate ourselves, get rid of the old debris, then yeah, we should pay attention and Continuing the foundations, floors and walls will be fortified.
The best engineering knowledge available today will bring the temple up to modern standards.
We will not be able to see the structural changes, but their effects will be real and important.
It's just more parallels with us. If you were to fix some of the things in your life, there's probably a lot of people that wouldn't know about it because we all put on a mask.
Only the Lord knows your heart. Only the Lord knows what you do in secret.
So, I like this. We will not be able to see the structural changes, but their effects will be real and important.
In all of this work, the temple's beautiful interior design design features will be preserved.
Okay, so let's go back to this. Uh, we see another spike right here in 2010. In 2011, that makes sense for two reasons. Um, one is in 2010 there was Oh my gosh, I can't remember. I It was at least an 8.0 earthquake.
Yeah, I'm pretty Yeah, it was like It was an 8.0 0 or something in the 8.0 range earthquake in Haiti that killed over 200,000 people. Uh, as far as natural disasters go, that is a lot.
Like when you get to the hundreds of thousands, that's like just completely catastrophic.
And then in 2011, there was an earthquake and tsunami that hit Japan.
Uh, it was probably the most cinematic natural disaster that I've ever witnessed. It looked like something straight out of the movies.
So, yeah, two very notable earthquakes in those two years. And, uh, as I was skimming through the talks, they both seem to reference those events. Like the the the two events that seem to be referenced were the were those two events. Okay. And then if we go back in time, you don't see a whole lot here in the, you know, 2000s, 90s, 80s. Uh there is a spike in 1971 and 1976 and then before that there's not a whole lot.
What's interesting about this, and I bring this up a lot whenever we look at this spreadsheet, if I were to send this back in time, like if I was if I was to give this to somebody back in 1942, uh, in in that case, I'd have to like print it out and give it to them so they have a physical copy and they could effectively look into the future in a way to see what is being talked about in general conference. Imagine that you're someone from 1942.
You might ask yourself when looking at these columns for earthquakes.
You know what what happened in 1971? Why is there a sudden spike? Uh what about 1976?
and pretty much this whole decade because relatively speaking, uh, the '7s kind of saw an uptick in talking about earthquakes, which doesn't surprise me because if you've been watching the channel for a while, whenever we look at these other words and phrases, and the more second coming related they are, the more you see this, you'll see a big spike uh, usually in like the ' 60s and '7s.
Um, and then it dies down and then it'll pick back up during President Nelson's presidency.
It's like it's it's a it's been a pretty consistent theme. There was something going on primarily in the 70s, it seems, that really spurred a lot of second coming talk and general conference. And I don't know what it was. I don't know if it's if it's because in 1967 you had the 6- day war in which Israel captured Jerusalem. Um I don't know if it has to do with like the independence visitors center being constructed, the purchase of Adam, um the construction of the BYU Jerusalem Center a little later on. That was all happening around this time. the church was very active with uh purchasing church sites and I want to get into it but I think this was also around the time that they started purchasing more of a the area the like the different parts of Nauvoo cuz you know that for a long time in Nauvoo there was a temple lot there was no temple until it was reconstructed during president president Hinckley's presidency so I don't know if there's like I don't No, but there was a spike around that time.
I decided to ask Gemini because Grock wasn't working. It was overloaded. You know, what happened in 1971? In 1976, were there like really notable earthquakes? And yes, there was. In 1971, there was the San Fernando uh Silar earthquake.
uh 65 deaths and over 500 million in damage.
And then there were a couple notable earthquakes uh elsewhere, one in Turkey, a thousand fatalities. And then you had two 8.0 or above earthquakes um called Solomon Islands dublet in July of that year in 1976.
Uh, and I had no idea about this. It says 1976 is is considered one of the deadliest years of seismic activity in recorded history.
So there was an earthquake in the Tang Shan or sorry the Tang Shan earthquake in China that killed about 242,000 people.
So, I didn't know up until now if there were any other earthquakes as bad as what we saw with um for example the Indonesian earthquake in 2004. It was an earthquake and a tsunami that killed over 200,000 and the 2010 Haitian earthquake that killed over 200,000.
Well, here's another one. It was in China and it was in 1976.
And then there were a few other like really bad earth like let's see the Guatemala earthquake over 23,000 people and 76,000 injured. The Philippines 8,000 deaths. Um and it was the deadliest earthquake in Philippine history. And then in Italy there was one a thousand deaths and 150,000 people homeless. So I didn't know this but yeah 1976 was a bad year for earthquakes.
Um worse than 1971.
So if we go back to this it makes sense.
It makes sense. And so you fast forward and then like I said you see this spike in 2010 2011 that makes sense because of uh Haiti and Japan.
But then the biggest spike that we see at least for uh the word earthquakes plural is in 2020.
And as far as I know that earthquake in Utah it didn't kill anybody. I don't know if there were other notable earthquakes, but from what I saw in the in the conference talks, they were mostly talking about this earthquake and the and also the renovation of the Salt Lake Temple.
So, it's just interesting. Uh these are signs of the times. It's being noted in general conference. Even if it's not on the nose, it should be clear enough when you're listening to them that they're pointing out that these are signs of the times.
Okay?
Let's move on. I've updated my spreadsheet called signs earthquakes.
Um, this graph right here shows you the total deaths by year from earthquakes.
Some of the data is probably incomplete.
This only goes back to 1985. Uh, because I get this date this data from Wikipedia. I'm not going to do like a big in-depth study. This is just the data that's readily available and it's accurate enough for our purposes.
But here you go. You have these two big spikes again in 2004 from the Indonesian earthquake and tsunami and then in 2010 uh the Haitian earthquake and then there's a few other sizable spikes. Um let me zoom zoom in.
So, we have all the numbers from 2025 and I'd say that there was a bit of an uptick.
Um, I have all the all these years on here ranked in column E and 2025 came in at 16th place.
Uh, so there was a total death toll across all the earthquakes of about 8,200.
So, if you put 2023 aside, you have to go all the way back to 2015 to see a deadlier year than 2025.
Um, if you go to the right over here, I noticed a couple things. Number one, there had been a a pretty long pause in um earthquakes in this range, 8.0 to 8.9. The last time that we had seen any was back in 2021 and there were three in that year, but then we went three years without earthquakes in that range. And then last year I had I made a video talking about this fact. I was like, you know, I don't know when we're going to have our next 8.0 nowhere above, but it's probably going to be soon because when you go back in time and you just see how frequently they happen, the average it's usually like once a year or once every other year. And so us having gone for 3 years without any 8.0's or above, it's probably going to happen sooner than later. And then it did that same day. The same day that I published that video, there was an 8.0 earthquake.
And it's this one right here. So, that was interesting and kind of notable. It was I'd say it was overdue.
But then look at column N um for the 4.0 to 4.9 range and 2025 out of these years that I that I have um going back to 2012.
It's in the number one spot with 16,000.
Now, if we go to the Wikipedia article for uh 2025 earthquakes, they have this table goes from 2025 back to 2015.
And so for that range, 2025 had the most uh 4.0 to 4.9. And then the most overall if you add up all the different magnitudes, uh 18,000 compared to these other years right here. So it didn't necessarily see more like large earthquakes, but if you take all the earthquakes together, uh there was an increase in 2025.
So I think that that's interesting.
Okay, the last thing I want to talk about, um, this is a little bit of a tangent, but I want to talk about the Las Vegas ne Nevada temple. This is a picture I took back in, um, probably 2008 or something like that with my SLR camera. I love this temple.
I love the temple grounds. I love the inside of the temple. I love Vegas and I love Phoenix and I love the the just the desert southwest.
I miss it so much. A couple other pictures I took. You may or may not know, but there's a kind of a miraculous story about the Las Vegas, Nevada Temple, uh that has to do with an earthquake.
We're going to look at this 2014 Desert News article, A Light on the Hill, Las Vegas, Nevada Temple reaches 25-year milestone.
This is by Trent Ton.
And I heard this story the first time I went to the Las Vegas, Nevada Temple. Um, it was a friend of mine. Her her dad drove me to the temple. I was visiting and I wanted to go to the temple. He drove me there and he told me this story. Uh, but today I'm adding it to my spreadsheets.
I have a spreadsheet called uh, signs church specific.
So, I have it right here. So, 1989, this was October 17th of that year. And then I put it on quotes A through Z. I made a new row for Las Vegas, Nevada Temple.
Here is the story.
Another interesting fact about the Las Vegas, Nevada Temple was recorded in in a book by Chad Hawkins, Holy Places, True Stories of Faith and Miracles from Latterday from Latter-day Temples.
In the book, Hawkins recounts how the window that was to be hung in the celestial room, okay, so this is the main thing. The window that was to be hung in the social room of the Las Vegas, Nevada temple was in a glass factory in Santa Cruz, California in October 1989 when a 7.1 magnitude earthquake hit the San Francisco Bay area and caused nearly 3 billion in damage.
The quake's epicenter was near Santa Cruz County. Hawkins wrote that the window had taken six weeks to make and was scheduled to be polished and shipped in time for the open house, which was two weeks away. Quote, "When the tremor hit, the window swung wildly, but amazingly escaped any damage.
Other glass projects in the factory were shattered, ruined beyond repair.
The window arrived intact one week before the temple opened for public viewing.
This is a good note to end on because this is how we want it to be for us for the second coming. We don't want to be among the other glass projects that are ruined beyond repair when Christ comes.
um or you know at the final judgment especially at the final judgment we want to be we want to be the one that remains intact uh I think the Lord he uses earthquakes and many other things to teach us lessons to give us warnings to um help our minds think about things a certain way so I don't think these stories and these miracles are just coincidence or pointless list or just interesting trivia. I think it's something that we should really consider.
But especially especially with the Salt Lake Temple, which uh we just learned today on this channel anyway, um that we have this fault line that goes right underneath the temple.
Very, very interesting.
All right. Well, that's going to be it for this one. I'll talk to you guys later.
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