Lecture 16 Earthquakes

What are earthquakes?

Elastic rebound theory
Waves generated by earthquakes:
P waves, S waves, Surface waves
Locating earthquakes
Earthquake magnitude
Earthquake distributions

Denali Earthquake 2002/11/03, 5km, M7.9

 Northridge earthquake, Jan 1994. The parking lot

at Cal State Univ. Northridge campus collapsed
during the earthquake.

What are earthquakes?

Earthquakes are vibrations of earth,
produced by the rupture and sudden
movement of rocks, which are caused by
stresses beyond the elastic limits of the
rocks.

 The point inside the Earth where the rupture

generates earthquake energy is called focus or
hypocenter. The point at the Earth's surface
directly above the focus is the epicenter.

Elastic rebound theory

Reid in early 20th century suggested that
earthquakes are caused by "spring back" of
deformed rocks (termed elastic rebound).
Example: The displacement in the 1906
San Francisco earthquake was as much as
15 feet.

 Elastic rebound. As
rock is deformed, it
bends, storing elastic
energy. Once strained
beyond its breaking
point, the rock cracks,
releasing the stored-up
energy, which
generates earthquake
waves.

 This fence was offset 2.5 m in the 1906 San

Francisco earthquake (G.K. Gilbert)

 Fault scarp produced by vertical displacement in

the 1964 Alaska earthquake. (USGS)

Waves generated by earthquakes

Three types of waves are generated by an
earthquake:
P waves (primary waves),
S waves (secondary waves)
Surface waves (Rayleigh waves, and Love
waves)

 P waves are compressional waves, which push

(compress) and pull (expand) rock particles in the
direction the waves are traveling.

 S waves are shear waves. The particles in S waves moves

at right angles to the direction the waves are traveling.

Surface waves
The motions of surface waves are more complex.
There are two types of surface waves that propagate
along Earth's surface: Rayleigh waves and Love
waves.

Surface waves are generally strongest waves.

Their amplitudes decay strongly with depth
(i.e. they are generally confined near the
surface).

 The particle motions of Love waves (top) are perpendicular to

the propagation direction and parallel to the surface. The particle
motions of Rayleigh waves (bottom) are along the
propagation direction and the vertical plane.

Wave speeds
P waves are faster than S waves.
S waves are faster than surface waves.
Thus, in a typical seismogram, P wave
arrives first, then S wave, and then surface
wave.

 Typical seismogram, showing P wave, S wave,

and surface wave.

 Seismograph. The inertia of the suspended mass

tends to keep it motionless, while the recording
instrument vibrates with the earth.

Locating earthquakes
Locating an earthquake requires four basic parameters: origin
time, and latitude, longitude, and depth of the hypocenter.
A basic method for locating an earthquake is using travel times
of P waves and S waves recorded at seismic stations.
For example, epicenter can be quickly estimated from the time
interval between the P wave and the S wave recorded at 3 or
more stations:
(1) Using one station, the distance between the epicenter and the
station can be estimated from the S-P time at the station.
(2) The epicenter can then located using distance estimates
from 3 or more stations.

 The distance to the epicenter can be determined using

S-P time. Here, the S-P time is 5 minutes, the
epicenter is about 3800 km (2350 miles) away.

 Earthquake epicenter can be located using the

distances obtained from travel times of three or
more seismic stations.

Earthquake magnitude
Earthquake magnitude measures the amount of
energy released by an earthquake.
The best-known magnitude scale is Richter scale,
developed by Charles Ricther of Caltech.
Richter magnitude is determined by (1) the largest
amplitude of the seismogram recorded at the
Wood-Anderson instrument and (2) the distance
from the focus.

 Richter scale can be determined graphically using a

seismogram recorded at a Wood-Anderson instrument.

 Richter scale is logarithmic. Each unit

increase corresponds to tenfold increase in
amplitude, and 32-fold increase in energy.
Thus, the largest amplitude of a magnitude
6 earthquake is 10 times as great as that of
magnitude 5. The energy released by a
magnitude 6 earthquake is 32 times that of a
magnitude 5 earthquake.

Earthquake distributions
A great majority of earthquakes originates
in a few narrow zone of the globe along
plate boundaries.

Earthquake depths
Earthquakes occur at depths from near the surface
to nearly 700 km, although a great majority of
earthquakes are shallow.
Shallow earthquakes: 0-70 km
intermediate earthquakes: 70 - 300 km
deep earthquakes: 300-700 km

 Wadati-Benioff zone at Tonga subduction zone. Almost all deep

earthquakes are associated with subduction zones. The focal
depths increase with the distances from the trench. These
subduction seismic zones are called Wadati-Benioff zones.