earthquakes Flashcards

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1
Q

travel-time graph

A

A graph of arrival times, commonly P or S waves, recorded at different points due to their distance from the focus of an earthquake. Used to find epicenter and determine when an earthquake occurred

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2
Q

stress

A

A force that acts on rock to change its shape or volume

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3
Q

elastic deformation

A

Caused when a material is compressed, bent, or stretched but will return to to its original shape

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4
Q

plastic deformation

A

permanent change in shape by bending and folding

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5
Q

fault

A

a crack in the earth’s crust

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6
Q

strike-slip fault

A

a type of fault where rocks on either side move past each other sideways with little up or down motion

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7
Q

Secondary Waves (S Waves)

A

type of seismic body waves that are slower and only travel through solids, move up and down

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8
Q

Primary Waves (P-Waves)

A

travel the fastest through rock material by causing particles in the rock to move back and forth, or vibrate, in the same direction as the waves are moving, also called compression wave

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9
Q

surface waves (L-waves)

A

seismic waves that ripple along Earth’s surface. Slowest moving, cause the most damage. They roll like ocean waves

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10
Q

triangulation of epicenter

A

the use of data from 3 seismic recording stations to locate the epicenter of an earthquake

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11
Q

moment magnitude scale

A

A scale that rates earthquakes by estimating the total energy released by an earthquake

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12
Q

tsunami

A

A giant wave usually caused by an earthquake beneath the ocean floor.

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13
Q

strain

A

deformation of rocks in response to stress

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14
Q

elastic limit

A

Maximum stress that a rock will withstand without permanent deformation

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15
Q

compression

A

Stress that squeezes rock until it folds or breaks

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16
Q

tension

A

Stress that stretches rock so that it becomes thinner in the middle

17
Q

Shearing

A

stress that pushes masses of rock in opposite directions, in a sideways movement

18
Q

normal fault

A

break in rock caused by tension forces, where rock above the fault surface moves down relative to the rock below the fault surface

19
Q

reverse fault

A

a type of fault where the rock above the fault slides upward; caused by compression in the crust

20
Q

seismic waves

A

vibrations that travel through Earth carrying the energy released during an earthquake

21
Q

Seismometer

A

Instrument used to measure horizontal or vertical motion during an earthquake.

22
Q

Seismogram

A

the record of an earthquake’s seismic waves produced by a seismometer

23
Q

Richter scale

A

A scale that rates an earthquake’s magnitude based on the size of its seismic waves.

24
Q

Modified Mercalli Scale

A

a scale that rates the amount of shaking from an earthquake