Earthquake
An earthquake is a sudden movement or trembling of the Earth's tectonic plates that creates shaking of the Earth's surface. High magnitude earthquakes in residential areas often lead to building damage.
Earthquakes are caused by disturbances in the balance of the earth. The different tectonic plates slowly move past each other. When they get stuck, they build up tension. The earthquake happens when the tectonic plates are suddenly released, so they start to move very quickly. An earthquake's first point of rupture is called its hypocenter, or focus. The epicenter is the point at ground level directly above the hypocenter.
People who study about earthquakes are called seismologists. There can be many earthquakes over a short period of time in a small area. The sudden release of tension in the tectonic plates sends waves of energy that travel through the Earth. Seismology studies the cause, repeats, type, and size of earthquakes.
The effect of an earthquake can be measured by a seismometer. It detects the shakes caused and it puts these movements on a seismograph. The strength, or magnitude, of an earthquake, is measured using the Richter scale. The Richter Scale was invented by Charles Francis Richter in 1935. The scale is numbered 0-10. On the scale, 2 is scarcely noticeable, and magnitude 5 (or more) creates damage over a wide area. The largest earthquake ever measured was a 9.5. An earthquake of 10 has never been recorded.
Scientists cannot predict an earthquake before it happens. But we do know where earthquakes might happen in the future, like close to fault lines. An earthquake under the ocean can create a huge wave called a tsunami. This can create just as much destruction as the earthquake itself. Earthquakes can also create landslides.
Earthquake zones are concentrated in some parts of the world. The first is the Pacific belt, which circles the Pacific Ocean. This part is the biggest seismic belt: it has the most active earthquakes and the most volcanoes.
The second part is the Alpide belt. It includes the seismic activities from Sumatra, to the Himalayas, to south Europe and north Africa, to the Atlantic Ocean.
These belts are along the edges of tectonic plates. The tectonic plates push on each other and make great amounts of tension.
Earthquakes sometimes hit cities and kill hundreds or thousands of people. Most earthquakes happen along the Pacific Ring of Fire but the biggest ones mostly happen in other places. Tectonically active places are places where earthquakes or volcanic eruptions are quite repeated.
Earthquakes are caused by tectonic movements in the Earth's crust. The main cause is when tectonic plates ride one over the other, causing orogeny (mountain building), and severe earthquakes.
The boundaries between moving plates form the largest fault surfaces on Earth. When they stick, motion between the plates leads to increasing stress. This continues until the stress rises and breaks, suddenly allowing sliding over the locked portion of the fault. This releases the stored energy as shock waves. The San Andreas fault in San Francisco, and Rift valley fault in Africa are faults like this.
1. Volcanic Earthquakes: Earthquakes which are caused by volcanic eruptions are quite devastating. However, these are confined to areas of active volcanoes.
2. Collapse Earthquakes: In areas of intense mining activity, often the roofs of underground mines collapse and minor tremors take place. These are called collapse earthquakes.
There are three main types of geological fault that may cause an earthquake: normal, reverse (thrust) and strike-slip. Normal faults occur mainly in areas where the crust is being extended. Reverse faults occur in areas where the crust is being shortened. Strike-slip faults are steep structures where the two sides of the fault slip horizontally past each other.
Most earthquakes form part of a sequence, related to each other in terms of location and time. Most earthquake clusters consist of small tremors which cause little to no damage, but there is a theory that earthquakes can recur in a regular pattern.
An aftershock is an earthquake that happens after a previous earthquake, the mainshock. An aftershock is in the same place of the main shock but always of a smaller magnitude. Aftershocks are formed as the crust adjusts to the effects of the main shock.
Earthquake swarms are sequences of earthquakes striking in a specific area within a short period of time. They are different from earthquakes followed by a series of aftershocks by the fact that no single earthquake in the sequence is obviously the main shock, therefore none have notably higher magnitudes than the other. An example of an earthquake swarm is the 2004 activity at Yellowstone National Park.
Sometimes a series of earthquakes happen in a sort of earthquake storm, where the earthquakes strike a fault in clusters, each triggered by the shaking or stress redistribution of the previous earthquakes. Similar to aftershocks but on adjacent segments of fault, these storms happen over the course of years, and with some of the later earthquakes as damaging as the early ones. Such a pattern happened in the North Anatolian fault in Turkey in the 20th century.
A Tsunami or a chain of fast moving waves in the ocean caused by powerful earthquakes is a very serious challenge for people's safety and for earthquake engineering. Those waves can inundate coastal areas, destroy houses and even swipe away whole towns. This is a danger for the whole mankind.
Unfortunately, tsunamis cannot be prevented. However, there are warning systems which may warn the population before the big waves reach the land to let them enough time to rush to safety.
Earthquake-proof buildings are constructed to withstand the destructive force of an earthquake. This depends upon its type of construction, shape, mass distribution, and rigidity. Different combinations are used. Square, rectangular, and shell-shaped buildings can withstand earthquakes better than skyscrapers. To reduce stress, a building's ground floor can be supported by extremely rigid, empty columns, while the rest of the building is supported by flexible columns inside the empty columns. Another method is to use rollers or rubber pads to separate the base columns from the ground, allowing the columns to shake parallel to each other during an earthquake.
To help prevent a roof from collapsing, builders make the roof out of light-weight materials. Outdoor walls are made with stronger and more reinforced materials such as steel or reinforced concrete. During an earthquake, flexible windows may help hold the windows together so they don't break.