DENVER POST - Trucks rolling through Front Range communities thumping the ground in the hunt for oil and gas are riling some residents.

Seismic exploration so unnerved Aurora homeowners earlier this year that the city has imposed new permitting requirements on companies. State regulators also are looking at their own rules.

When seismic surveyors roll – under contract by companies or on spec – they place seismic sensors slightly smaller than car batteries across neighborhoods. Then the trucks, weighing up to 30 tons, drop heavy, metal vibrator plates from their undercarriages to thump and shake the ground. Analysis of pressure waves, similar to ultrasound, generates data that companies use to determine where to drill for oil and gas.

Federal standards set for the mining industry limit the intensity of vibrations. Contract technicians, who work for seismic companies, tag along with the trucks measuring vibrations to ensure compliance with limits.

The Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission this week was investigating complaints that seismic surveying cracked walls and wrecked a water well at a Weld County home.

Read more of Bruce Finley's story in The Denver Post.

(Copyright 2013 The Denver Post)