denali national park and preserve is located in an area of intense tectonic activity: the pacific plate is subducting under the north american plate, creating the denali fault system, which is a right-lateral strike-slip fault over long. this is a part of the larger fault system which includes the famous san andreas fault of california. over 600 earthquakes occur in the park each year, helping seismologists to understand this fault system. most of these earthquakes are too small to be felt, although two large earthquakes did occur in 2002. on october 23, 2002 a magnitude 6.7 earthquake occurred in the park, and on november 3, 2002, a magnitude 7.9 earthquake occurred. these earthquakes did not cause a significant loss of life or property, since the area is very sparsely populated, but they did trigger thousands of landslides.