The Occurrence

and
Distribution
of
Earthquakes
Tell me a
story
 MONDAY, JANUARY 14, 1907, 3:30 p.m. It was a regular day ­
sunny and hot ­with a cloudless sky and what was said to be a faint
breeze. At 3:32 p.m. the city of Kingston was busy enough ­all was
alive and well. Suddenly there came the sound of a rushing, mighty
wind, followed by the sound of a train roaring in a tunnel and the
violent shaking of the earth so that men and buildings were tossed
about like puppets. Screams split the air. Within 10-20 seconds a town
of 46,000 had been rendered immobile ­hundreds lay dead or dying
buried beneath mounds of rubble and dust. By 3:33 p.m. three shocks
had been felt and every building in Kingston sustained some damage;
many in the lower part of the city were destroyed.
 The Daily Gleaner
 A sudden shaking of the
earths surface caused by
the release of energy
What is an along lines of weakness
Earthquake?
in the earth’s crust, such
as plate boundaries and
faults.
  A seismograph, or seismometer, is an
instrument used to detect and record
earthquakes.
Detecting and  The power of an earthquake is measured
Recording using a seismometer. A seismometer detects

Earthquakes the vibrations caused by an earthquake. It

plots these vibrations on a seismograph.
  The strength, or magnitude, of an
earthquake is measured using the
Richter scale. The Richter scale is
numbered 0-10 with 10 being the
greatest strength or magnitude,
though there is no upper limit.
Earthquake
Magnitude
 It is logarithmic which means, for
example, that an earthquake
measuring magnitude 5 is ten times
more powerful than an earthquake
measuring 4.
 Earthquakes measuring 1-2
on the scale happen
regularly, and they are so
small that people cannot
Did you Know?
The largest earthquake
feel them.
ever recorded was in
Chile in 1960, which
measured 9.5 on the
Richter scale.
Earthquakes measuring
upwards of 7 are less
frequent but very powerful,
and can cause a lot of
destruction.
 What is an
Earthquake?
 The Richter scale is not very
accurate in measuring these
larger earthquakes and today
scientists use the Moment
Magnitude Scale which uses
the same logarithmic scale but
which more accurately measures
the strength of larger
earthquakes.

 The Richter scale rates earthquakes based on the size of their
seismic waves, as measured by seismographs.

 The Moment Magnitude Scale rates earthquakes based on the

total amount of energy they release.

 To determine the moment magnitude rating, seismologists

measure the surface area of the ruptured fault and how far the
land moved along the fault.

 An earthquake’s Richter rating and moment magnitude rating

are not always the same.
  The amount of damage caused
by an earthquake is measured by
the Mercalli Scale.

Earthquake  This is a measure of intensity,

Intensity and changes according to which
area you are measuring - damage
nearer the epicentre would
usually be greater than further
away.

While the Mercalli
scale describes the intensity of an
earthquake based on its observed
effects, the Richter
scale describes the earthquake's
magnitude by measuring
the seismic waves generated by
an earthquake.
 Mercalli ratings, which are given as Roman
numerals, are based on largely subjective
interpretations.
 A low intensity earthquake, one in which only some
people feel the vibration and there is no significant
property damage, is rated as a II.
 The highest rating, a XII, is applied to earthquakes in
which structures are destroyed, the ground is cracked
and other natural disasters, such as landslides or
tsunamis, are initiated.
 Earthquakes occur all the
Global time all over the world,
Distribution of both along plate margins
Earthquakes and along faults.
 Describe the
Distribution of
Earthquakes
 Regional
Distribution of
Earthquakes in
the Caribbean
 Where do  Earthquakes occur:

Earthquake  At all plate boundaries

 At fault lines
s Occur?
A TRANSFORM PLATE
MARGIN  E.g. The Northern Boundary of the Caribbean Plate: N.
America (West), Caribbean (East)
 What effect
could this have
on the
landscape?
A CONVERGENT BOUNDARY: E.g. Nazca (East), South
SUBDUCTION ZONE America (West)
DIVERGENT PLATE BOUNDARIES E.g. Mid Atlantic Ridge; South America
(West), Africa (East)
  Earthquakes can also occur far
from the edges of plates, along
faults.
Earthquak  Faults are cracks in the earth where

es at Fault sections of a plate (or two plates)

are moving in different directions.
Lines  Faults are caused by all that
bumping and sliding the plates do.
They are more common near the
edges of the plates.
 TYPES OF FAULTS

What does each of the above images show?

Normal faults are the cracks
where one block of rock is
sliding downward and away
from another block of rock.

These faults usually occur in

areas where a plate is very
slowly splitting apart or where
two plates are pulling away from
each other.

A normal fault is defined by the

hanging wall moving down
relative to the footwall, which is
moving up.
Reverse faults are cracks formed
where one plate is pushing into
another plate.

They also occur where a plate is

folding up because it's being
compressed by another plate
pushing against it.

At these faults, one block of rock

is sliding underneath another block
or one block is being pushed up
over the other.

A reverse fault is defined by the

hanging wall moving up relative to
the footwall, which is moving
down.
Strike-slip or Transform
faults are the cracks between two
plates that are sliding past each
other.

You can find these kinds of faults

in California. The San Andreas
fault is a strike-slip fault.

It's the most famous California

fault and has caused a lot of
powerful earthquakes.
Spur Tree Hill, Manchester, Jamaica
  https://
www.visionlearning.com/en/library/Earth-Science/6/Plates-
Plate-Boundaries-and-Driving-Forces/66

 http://
www.geosci.usyd.edu.au/users/prey/Teaching/Geol-3101/Pa
leostress02/faults.html
 https://www.sciencelearn.org.nz/resources/340-seismic-
waves
 https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/guides/ztp2k7h/revision/
Sources: 2#:~:text=The%20power%20of%20an
%20earthquake,measured%20using%20the%20Richter
%20scale.
 https://www.rbgusd.k12.ca.us/view/2743.pdf
 http://www.geo.mtu.edu/UPSeis/where.html
 https://www.pinterest.co.uk/pin/493355334179006265/
 https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Simon_Mitchell/
publication/228797540/figure/fig1/
AS:300885323337729@1448748059423/Simplified-
geological-map-of-Jamaica-showing-the-locations-of-the-
Cretaceous-inliers.png