Mechanical wave is a disturbance that move through a medium. A medium is something that helps this effect to happen. Earthquake waves are mechanical waves and the energy transferred is through compression and rarefaction.
Earth has few layers and one of them is the lithosphere. It is broken down to tectonic plates and sometimes these plates slide inside the earth. This activity causes the earthquakes.Earthquake waves are also known as Seismic waves and they can be measured using a seismometer. The measurement gives an earthquake a number on the Richter scale. The largest earthquake ever recorded was in Chile in 1960, and registered a 9.5 on the Richter scale.
Always when the earthquake strikes, everyone begin to panic, diving for the nearest sturdy table or door-frame. But Earthquakes, like light, sound, or infrared, are nothing more than waves. So, how is it that a wave can cause such incredible damage? And What kind of waves exactly causes these painful damages to our lives?
Earthquakes generate three types of seismic waves: P (primary) waves, S (secondary) waves and surface waves, which arrive at seismic recording stations one after another. All of this waves carry extremely high energy.. Both P and S waves penetrate the interior of the Earth while surface waves release it’s energy
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The primary wave moves faster, and therefore, arrives at a particular location first, which is why it is called the primary wave. It is a longitudinal wave, which means that it vibrates the ground parallel to the direction in which it is moving. You can think of it as shaking the ground up and down or side to side. Because of this, it tends to cause the least damage of any of the types of seismic waves. These P waves are able to travel through both solid rock, such as granite mountains, and liquid material, such as volcanic magma or the water of the oceans. P waves travel through all parts of the
Earthquakes are best described as a shaking or vibration of the ground caused by breaking of rock. Sometimes they are very strong and other times you would hardly notice them. This shaking occurs when stress that builds up in the crust is suddenly released as the crust breaks free and/or slides against the other pieces of crust. Earthquakes may also be thought of as the breaking of a popsicle stick by applying pressure to both ends at the same time. Should you try this experiment , you will feel the pressure build up as you apply more force until the stick snaps. When the stick snaps you will feel an instant of pain at your fingers as the stress reduces and energy waves move throughout the stick. When the earth's crust is placed under similar types of stress, binding as the stress builds, it will also snap and release the energy into the surrounding rocks, 'ooch'. Thinking about earthquakes will become more clear if you try another experiment.
Earthquakes play a major role into understanding the composition and materials that exist within the Earth (Merali and Skinner, 2009, p.252). Earthquakes are the main source of insight into the inner workings of the earth, due to the nature of the seismic waves they produce. P and S waves are reflected and refracted at different boundaries within the earth, and this enables seismologists to make inferences about the internal composition and structural of planet Earth. (Merali and Skinner, 2009, p.252).
Earthquakes are a natural part of the Earth’s evolution. Scientific evidence leads many geologists to believe that all of the land on Earth was at one point in time connected. Because of plate tectonic movements or earthquakes, continental drift occurred separating the one massive piece of land in to the seven major continents today. Further evidence supports this theory, starting with the Mid-Atlantic ridge, a large mass of plate tectonics, which are increasing the size of the Atlantic Ocean while shrinking the Pacific. Some scientists believe that the major plate moveme...
The science of the natural disaster has baffled many, but from studying the San Francisco earthquake, scientists have made a number of important discoveries and they have a better understanding of earthquakes. At 5:12 on a fateful April morning in 1906, the mammoth Pacific and North American plates sheared at an incredible twenty-one feet along the San Andreas fault, surpassing the annual average of two inches (“San Francisco Earthquake of 1906”)(“The Great 1906 Earthquake and Fires”). The shearing caused a loud rumble in the Californian city of San Francisco. A few seconds later, the destructive earthquake occurred. The ground shifted at almost five feet per second, and the shaking could be felt all the way from southern Oregon to southern Los Angeles to central Nevada (“Quick”)(“The Great 1906 San Francisco Earthquake”). Moreover, the earthquake could be recorded on a seismograph in Capetown, South Africa, an astounding 10,236 miles away from San Francisco (“San Francisco ea...
The wave is a result of the water attempting to regain its equilibrium, which is driven by gravity. The size of the wave is determined by how much the sea floor moves vertically, and how quickly it shifts. A greater water depth helps as well. They can travel up to five hundred miles an hour and have wave heights of one hundred feet. Earthquakes are the leading cause of tsunamis.
From studying the science behind the San Francisco earthquake, scientists have made a number of important discoveries involving how earthquakes function. At 5:12 on a fateful April morning in 1906, the mammoth Pacific and North American plates sheared each other at an incredible twenty-one feet along the San Andreas fault, surpassing the annual average of two inches (“San Francisco Earthquake of 1906”) (“The Great 1906 Earthquake and Fires”). A few seconds later, the destructive earthquake occurred. The ground shifted at almost five feet per second, and the shaking could be felt all the way from southern Oregon to southern Los Angeles to central Nevada (“Quick”) (“The Great 1906 San Francisco Earthquake”). In fact, the earthquake could be registered in a seismograph on Capetown, South Africa, an astounding 10,236 miles away...
Before examining the Northridge event, understanding the naturally occurring hazard that is an earthquake will help to better understand exactly what happened and why it was such an important geological event. With four distinct layers, two layers, the crust and upper portion of the mantle, compose the skin that is the surface layer of the Earth. The crust is not a single, continuous piece. It is actually several different pieces, or plates, that come together to form the puzzle that comprises the surface of the Earth. These plates are in constant motion rubbing against one another. These areas, known as fault lines, where the plates rub up against one another have spots where one plate ”gets stuck while the rest of the plate keeps moving. When the plate has moved far enough, the edges unstick and is how most of the earthquakes around the world occur” (Wald, 2012). The energy stored from the friction of the two plate...
Mr. Adams describes the San Francisco earthquake as his most profound human suffering experience because the horror of shaking floors, parts of his mom’s house collapse to the floor, and got a broken nose from stumbling into a brick wall (Ansel Adams & The 1906 Earthquake 2008). Earthquakes are part of natural disasters of the earth and normally caused by shaking ground and rapid movement of one block of rock slipping past another a long fractures in the earth crust called faults. Faults that are usually locked excluding abrupt movements, which slippage creates an earthquake (Lutgens, F. & Tarbuck, E.
The basic science is pretty straightforward. The earth lurches from time to time because its outer shell is broken into huge, solid plates floating on a layer of molten rock that has the consistency of Silly Putty. These tectonic plates are constantly jostling each other, like rafts crowded into a small pond, and its along the boundaries where they meet that most quakes are born.
They are the earth’s crust; they move very slowly every year. As the tectonic plates slide over each other they cause earthquakes. Earthquakes produce various damaging effects this includes damage to structures of buildings, bridges and other standing formations which then...
A wave can be defined as a disturbance that travels through a medium, which carries energy. Medium is just the material in which the wave causes disturbance. On earth most of the mediums are, oxygen and water. “The basis for an understanding of sound, music and hearing is the physics of waves. Sound is a wave that is created by vibrating objects and propagated through a medium from one location to another.”(1)The most common objects used by teachers and people explaining sound waves are a tuning fork, and a slinky. A tuning fork because of the vibrations, that can be seen, and heard by tapping the tuning fork into another harder object. Slinkys are simply used, because it gives a great visual illustration of how a wave works. Since a sound waves cause disturbance through the medium they’re traveling through, a sound wave is characterized as a mechanical wave.
Earthquakes are vibrations felt at the surface of the earth which are caused by disturbances of the energy in the earth's interior. These vibrations are known as seismic waves. (Skinner Robinson McVerry 1) There are different type sof seisimc waves such as Primary (P) waves, whcih travel the fastest, Secondary (S) waves which cause the earth to vibrate vertically, Surface (L) waves. P and S waves are "affected by changes in the density and the rigidity of the materials through which they pass." (Columbia Encyclopedia) Earthquakes vary in their intensity and duration. Often times they are strong enough to cause massive destriction. Tall buildings often suffer as a result of these natural disasters. In recent years this has become a larger and larger threat with both the number of large buildings, and their number of occupants increasing. In an effort to try to minimize the damage caused by earthquakes many some engineers focus primarily on designing and constructing earthquake resistant buildings. Earthquake engineers have gathered much of their information from analyzing past earthquakes, and learning which buildings can and can't withstand the tremors. The goals of these engineers is to design buildings that can withstand moderate earthquakes and obtain minimal damage, and that the buildings will not collapse lowering the probability of human deaths.
Earthquakes belong to the class of most disastrous natural hazards. They result in unexpected and tremendous earth movements. These movements results from dissemination of an enormous amount of intense energy in form of seismic waves which are detected by use of seismograms. The impact of earthquakes leaves behind several landmarks including: destruction of property, extensive disruption of services like sewer and water lines, loss of life, and causes instability in both economic and social components of the affected nation (Webcache 2).
Earthquakes evidence themselves by shaking, trembling, and sometimes movement of the ground. They are caused by a slipper in the inner earthly faults. They can swing in capacity and in size, from the ones that are so weak that people don’t even feel, to those that can toss people around and can also destroy an entire city with its violent movement. Earthquakes by themselves unfrequently kill people. It is usually the secondary events, like buildings collapsing, tsunamis, fires, and volcanoes. Many of this type of things can be avoided by a better construction, early warning, and safety
There are 15 main different tectonic plates spread around the globe. Earthquakes can be recorded with seismometers. The magnitude of Richter is the most common scale. Earthquakes are movements of the Earth caused by the release of stress accumulated by geologic faults or by volcanic activity. In the last years, many scientists think that drilling for oil and gas (fracking) causes earthquakes too. There are three different types of earthquakes that will be defined in this discussion.