Lecture 1 Earthquakes, global tectonics and man. Motivations for studying earthquakes It is the...
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Transcript of Lecture 1 Earthquakes, global tectonics and man. Motivations for studying earthquakes It is the...
Motivations for studying earthquakes
It is the legitimate ambition of every properly constituted geologist to see a glacier,witness an eruptionand feel an earthquake.
G.K. Gilbert, in D.S. Jordan (ed.), The Investigation of the California Earthquake of 1906, 1907
The glacier is always ready, awaiting his visit;the eruption has a course to run, and alacrity only is needed to catch its more important phases;but the earthquake, unheralded and brief, may elude him through his entire lifetime.
It had been my fortune to experience only a single weak tremor, and I had, moreover, been tantalized by narrowly missing the great Inyo earthquake of 1872 and the Alaska earthquake of 1899.
When, therefore, I was awakened in Berkeley on the eighteenth of April last by a tumult of motions and noises, it was with unalloyed pleasure that I became aware that a vigorous earthquake was in progress. …
Loma Prieta, Ca 1989 6.9 62 urban
Northridge, Ca 1994 6.7 51 urban
Tabas, Iran 1978 7.2 11,000 v. rural
Rudbar, Iran 1990 7.3 40,000 rural
Zirkuh, Iran 1995 7.2 1,600 v. rural
Bam, Iran 2003 6.5 50,000 town
Location date magnitude deaths
Areas of the World scaled according to Property Insurance Premium Income
AustraliaNew Zealand
Africa
South Africa
Hong Kong
Israel
TaiwanTurkey
Denmark
Ireland
Sweden
Germany
France
Belgium
UK
Italy
Switzerland
China
Indonesia
Philippines
Luxembourg
Greece
Netherlands
Norway
Hong Kong
Portugal
Spain
Germany
Taiwan
Turkey
Mexico
Canada
USA
Venezuela
Colombia
Ecuador
Peru
Chile
Guatemala
Puerto Rico
Jamaica
Israel
The world seen economically… RMS Ltd
Cities with more than 500,000 inhabitants
Within 100 km of an active fault system
Not within 100 km of a major active fault system
Istanbul -100,000s Tehran -
millions
Himalayan front -millions
West Sumatra -500,000
Some examples of large potential seismic disasters
The biggest natural disaster ever?
Earthquakes: dead1556 Shensi, China 830,000 1920 Haiyuan, China 235,0001923 Tokyo, Japan 143,0001976 Tangshan, China >243,000
Coastal cyclones and windstorms1737 Calcutta 300,0001876 Bangladesh 215,0001881 Haifeng, China 300,0001970 Bangladesh 300,000
Floods1642 China (dam burst) 900,0001887 China (Huang Ho) 900,0001931 China (Yangtze Kiang) 1,400,0001938 China (dam demolition) 500,0001959 N. China 2,000,000
Data from Munich Re