The Restless Earth Earthquakes Flashcards
Where is the epicentre and focus of an earthquake?
What causes earthquakes?
Movement of the tectonic plates and the release of pressure caused by friction between them.
What plate boundaries can earthquakes occur on?
Destructive
Conservative
Collision
Constructive
(ALL 4!)
Where do most earthquakes occur?
Close to plate boundaries, especially destructive plate margins like that under Japan
How do we measure eathquakes?
Richter Scale (scientific)
Mercalli scale (observation)
What is the Richter scale?
A logarithmic scale that multiplies to the power of 10
i.e. 2 is 10x bigger than 1.
What is the Mercalli Scale?
A scale from 1-12 that measures what damage we observe.
An example of an earthquake in aricher area of the world?
Kobe, Japan, 17th January 1995, 7.2 magnitude
6,434 deaths, 40,000 injured
Phillipines and Eurasian Plates
Short term effects: fires caused by pipes bursting, damage to the Hanshin Expressway, 70% railways damaged
Long term effects: economy suffered, Panisonic closed temporarily
Short term responses: Emergency services struggled to reach people because of fires and roads being damaged
Long term responses: New buildings built further apart to prevent domino effect and fires spreading; business debts wiped off to help them recover.
Earthquake case study for a poorer part of the world?
Sichuan, China, 12th May 2008, 7.9, Indian and Eurasian plate
69,000 dead, 374,000 injured, 11 million homeless
Short term effect: 80% buildings collapsed including schools where thousands of children died, including 900 in one secondary school. Landslides meant army couldn’t get to worst areas
Long term effects: Homeless for years, poverty
Response: China initially turned down international help and sent in the army. They struggled to get there and sent water and food supplies. Later international help was recieved from Asian counties. Parentas were angry about the deaths in schools caused by poor building materials used. China denied responsibility.
