Effects of An Earthquake On Lithosphere
Effects of An Earthquake On Lithosphere
Effects of An Earthquake On Lithosphere
Albertosaurus
& Corythosaurus
Anatosaurus
Meteor impact causing dinosaur
extinction
Carnotaurus
Monoclonius
Tyrannosaurus
rex
Tyrannos
aurus
rex
Corythosaurus
Parasaurolophus
Gallimimus
Triceratops
Triceratops
& Tyrannosaurus
Tarbosaurus
Kronosaurus
Pteranodon
Reference
http://www.geo.mtu.edu/UPSeis/locating.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epicenter
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earthquake
Figure 2: A seismograph
Figure 3: A seismogram
"An earthquake was recorded in San Diego. The seismograph record shows that P-waves first
arrived at 10:02-09 PST (read this is "10:02 and 9 seconds, AM, Pacific Standard Time"), and Swaves arrived at 10:03-04 PST. What is the lag time for this earthquake?"
ANSWER
Since S-waves arrived later, you may subtract the time of arrival of the P-waves from it. To do this,
you may need to "borrow" extra seconds from the minutes column (much like grade school
arithmetic, where fractions may be borrowed from the whole numbers column).
S-wave arrival time = 10:03, 4 seconds
=>
=>
10:02, 64 seconds
- 10:02,
9 seconds (subtract)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------ANSWER =
55 seconds
To calculated lag time using the arithmetic method, a simplified method using rounded off speed
numbers is illustrated below. If you are given information about how fast P-waves and S-waves
each travel, a certain lag time will correspond to a certain distance that may be traveled by
earthquake waves. In other words, if P-waves travel at 4.00 miles per second, and S-waves travel
at 2.50 miles per second, and the lag time is 15 seconds, the distance of the earthquake epicenter
will be 100 miles. The method of this calculation is shown below.
Velocity (speed) = V
Velocity =
Time =
Distance
Time
Distance
Velocity
TimeP-waves
100 miles
TimeS-waves
4.00 miles = 25 sec.
second
= 100 miles
2.50 miles
second
=40 sec.
"How fast..."
speed
time
"How far..."
distance
Use formula
distance
time
distance
speed
Speed X Time
10 hours
Vehicle B
500 miles =
25 miles
hour
20 hours
So, the lag time difference between the two vehicles (10 hours - 5 hours) is 5
hours. What would the lag time be if the distance traveled were 500
miles?
Vehicle A would take 10 hours to travel 500 miles, but Vehicle B would take 20
hours. The lag time here is 10 hours. So, the pattern you should note here
is "the greater the distance, the longer the lag time."
The same method of calculation may be used for earthquake waves (P-waves
and S-waves). However, you must use consistent units. If you are given speed
units which are "miles per second," you must not mix them with "miles per
hour."
The central assumption for using this methodology for calculating the distance
to the earthquake epicenter is that the speed of the earthquake waves does
not change with distance. However, in reality, this does not hold true over long
distances, especially if the earthquake waves penetrate the denser layers of
the earth's interior, which causes earthquake waves to speed up in general.
Los Angeles
San Francisco
Salt Lake City
Albuquerque
11:06-06 PST
11:06-46 PST
12:08-06 MST
12:08-45 MST
11:06-19 PST
11:07-18 PST
12:09-22 MST
12:10-15 MST
Lag time?
seconds
seconds
seconds
seconds
2. Assuming an average velocity of 3.80 miles/second for the P-waves, and 2.54 miles/second
for the S-waves, how long does it take for each type to travel 100 miles? Show how you arrived at
your answer.
What is the lag time associated with this distance (100 miles)?
3. Determine the distance from each of the four seismograph stations to the epicenter of the
earthquake. Distance may be computed by proportion, using the lag time value to 100 miles that
you obtained in Problem 2.
Recording Station Calculated Distance (miles)?
Los Angeles:
San Francisco:
Albuquerque:
Salt Lake City:
miles
miles
miles
miles
4. On the base map of the western United States (Figure 4), draw circles or arcs with a compass,
locating the needle point at each of the four stations, with each radius corresponding to the
calculated distance (use the graphic scale on the base map for measurement).
Where is the epicenter located?
Which city is the earthquake epicenter closes to, and how far?
5. Considering the cause of earthquakes discussed during lecture, what major structural feature is
probably related to this earthquake?
6. The time at which the P-wave arrived at each of the four stations is shown on the seismograph
record (Problem 1). But when did the earthquake actually occur? Show how you obtained your
answer.
accomplished by man is less than about 3 miles into the Earth's crust. We thus have no direct
observation of the thousands of miles of rock below the surface. Seismic waves may be artificially
generated with explosives, and then monitored for changes in travel velocities and intensities.
Seismic waves increase their speed when traveling through denser material; S-waves cannot travel
through liquids. It has been determined by seismologists that the mantle rock is denser than the
crust, and the outer core of the Earth is composed of liquid iron, while the still denser inner core is
solid.
The above graph illustrates that earthquake waves do not travel at a constant velocity over long distances; rather, they speed up as they
travel through the denser rock of the earth's interior. In fact, this speeding up is one of the major evidences of the greater density of
the mantle rock and the earth's core. Note on the graph that with increasing distances, the travel time required steadily decreases for
both S-waves and P-waves. Contrast this method with the previous one, which assumed that the speed of P-waves and S-waves
remained constant. The first method would only work for shallow focus earthquakes that traveled through the crust, but not the
mantle. To read the above graph, remember that the lag time "fits" only into the shaded (yellow if you have a color version) portion
between the two curved lines. Use the edge of a blank sheet of paper to find out how many minutes "fit" between the two curves at a
given distance. Or, conversely, given a lag time, you measure out this distance on a sheet of paper by making two marks; "ride" the Pwave curve with one mark until the other mark "falls" on the S-wave curve, while keeping the edge of your paper parallel with the
graph markings. Then, read off the edge of your paper to find the distance to the epicenter. Your accuracy for distance should be
within the 100 miles, and for lag-time, within 0.1 minute.
A seismogram is the graph output from a seismograph, which is used to determine the epicenter of
an earthquake. When consulting the seismogram, P-waves always appear before S-waves, as they
travel faster and can travel through three states of matter as opposed to one.
Example
Adjust the sliders to change the arrival times of the P-wave and the S-wave.
Suppose the P-wave arrives at t = 1.0 s and the S-wave arrives at t = 6.0 s. Determine the distance of
the earthquake epicenter given the following information.
Solution
To determine the distance of the earthquake epicenter, you can use the steps in the previous section.
1. Determine the arrival times of the P-wave and the S-wave:
Arrival time of P-wave: 1.0 s
Arrival time of S-wave: 6.0 s
2. Calculate the difference between the arrival time of the P-wave and the S-wave.
Time Difference =
6.0 1.0=5.0 s
3. Refer to the Earthquake Time Travel Graph. Determine the location on the graph where the two
curves have a time difference equal to the time difference you previously calculated.
After looking at the consulting the Earthquake Time Travel Graph, it is clear that the two curves have
a difference of 5 units on the time axis at x = 3.4. Therefore the earthquake has an epicenter
distance of
2.
3.
4.
5.
Introduction
An earthquake occurs when rocks in the crust move. This movement releases energy that is transmitted outward
as seismic waves. Seismic stations have instruments that can sense and record seismic waves, even those from
earthquakes that occur thousands of miles away from the station. Earthquakes generate several different types of seismic
waves, and these waves each travel at different speeds through rock. The fastest waves (traveling at about 6 km/sec
through most crustal rocks) are the first to arrive at seismic stations and are called primary (P) waves. The next fastest
waves travel at about 3.5 km/sec, so they arrive at seismic stations later and have been termed secondary (S) waves. The
farther these waves travel away from the source of the earthquake, the more the P waves will outpace the S waves.
The epicenter of an earthquake is a virtual point on the surface that is located directly above the source of the earthquake.
The farther a given seismic station is from an epicenter, the longer thetime interval between the arrival of the P waves and
the arrival of the S waves. This time interval can be expressed mathematically as a function of the distance from the
epicenter and the speeds of the P and S waves through rock. If we know what those two speeds are, and measure the time
interval between the P and S arrivals at the seismic station, we can easily calculate how far the epicenter was from that
seismic station.
The sequence of problems below will show you how this is done.
Using math to find the epicenter of an earthquake
Notation
The variables are:
tp = number of seconds a P wave travels after the instant of the earthquake;
ts = number of seconds a S wave travels after the instant of the earthquake;
dp = distance (in km) P waves have traveled in tp seconds; and
ds = distance (in km) S waves have traveled in ts seconds
Step 1: Write an equation that shows how far each type of wave traveled
aftert seconds?
Hint:
to write the two equations that express distance traveled by the waves in terms
of lapsed time. Your answer should be written in the form
dp = mptp, and ds = msts,
where mp and ms are the slopes of the lines.
Step 2:
A) Solve each of the two equations from Step 1 for times, ts and tp. Since the
distance is the same for each wave, denote this by D (= dp = ds).
B) Take the difference of the results from Part A; be sure your answer is
positive. Denote this difference by the variable U.
C) What does your answer to Part B represent?
D) Solve the equation from Part B for distance D.
The table below shows four seismic stations near New Mexico (represented by 3- and 4-letter codes) with latitude and
longitude coordinates given in columns 2 and 3. Columns 4 and 5 indicate the times that P and S waves were received at the
stations. The last three blank columns are for arrival time of P- and S-waves differences U, distances D from the stations to
the epicenter of the earthquake, and scaled down distances for the map shown below.
Station
1. TUC
Arrival Time
P-waves
3:31:25
Arrival Time
S-waves
Time
Diff
U
Dist to
Epicenter
D
Scaled
Distance
for Map
3:31:54
2. ANMO
3:31:28
3:32:00
3. GDL2
3:31:45
3:32:29
4. LTX
3:32:22
3:33:32
Step 3:
A) From the data given in the table above, compute the time differences in
seconds that P and S waves were received at the stations. Complete the column
Step 4.
This a Google Earth map. The four markers locate the four stations listed in the
table. From the latitude and longitude coordinates in the table, locate and
identify each station.
Step 5.
Next, you will need to figure out the scale on the map.
A) Measure, in inches, the east-west distance on the map along the southern
border of New Mexico from Texas to Arizona.
The real distance between these locations is 565.56 kilometers (Google Earth).
B) Now use this information to figure the scale for this map in km/inch.
Step 6.
This is the final step!
A) Convert the distances D to fit the scale on the map; fill in the last
column,Scaled Distance for Map, in the table with these data.
B) Use the distances you computed in the table for U and the scale for the map
to draw a circle with center at each station and radius the scaled distance from
that station to the epicenter.
C) Look at these circles and locate the epicenter.
D) What are the coordinates of the epicenter? What city or town is it near?
Follow-up Steps
Epicenter: Answers
dp =6tp; ds =3.5ts
tp = dp /6; ts = ds /3.5
A&B
Station
Time Diff
(U)
Dist to Epicenter
(D)
1. TUC
30
252
2. ANMO
32
269
3. GDL2
44
370
4. LTX
70
588
A)
Scaled Distance for Map
Station
1. TUC
2.45
2. ANMO
2.62
3. GDL2
3.6
4. LTX
5.72
B, C, D) Draw Circles with centers at Stations and radii shown in the table. Epicenter at 33.00N,
108.23W just north of Silver City (See map)
This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant
GEO-0355224. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this
material are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science
Foundation.