March 11, 2011
The Science Behind the Japanese Earthquake
Location of the 8.9 magnitude earthquake that struck off the east coast of Honshu, Japan. Courtesy of USGS.
Here are some links that help explain the science behind this morning’s magnitude 8.9 earthquake off the coast of Japan and resulting tsunami:
A summary from the USGS Earthquake Hazards Program
Mountain Beltway explains the geology of the quake
The USGS has a collection of links about earthquakes in Japan
Scientific American has a nice guide to earthquakes and explanation of what causes a tsunami
Discovery News has video of the tsunami in Japan
The Pacific Tsunami Warning System listed warnings around the Pacific (and has good information about tsunamis and the warning system)
And here’s last month’s post on the factors that contribute to the destructiveness of an earthquake
And Smithsonian’s story about historic earthquakes and tsunamis in the Pacific Northwest
Please add your own links in the comments.
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[...] Here’s a set of links from Sarah Zielinski’s Surprising Science blog at Smithsonian.com on the science of the earthquake and tsunami. [...]
[...] interested in earthquake and tsunami science, Smithsonian.com’s Surprising Science blog has a nice collection of resources. Related Posts:Quaking in the labA safety culture starts with leadershipFriday round-upFriday [...]
Surprising Science – congrats on your DCSWA Newsbrief award. I shared your info on tsunami science with GovLoop.
http://www.govloop.com/profiles/blogs/japanese-earthquake-and-2
Really big disaster. I hope Japan will recover the the nuclear factory will not cause more problems.
[...] been a busy year for natural disasters: the earthquake and tsunami in Japan; tornadoes, flooding and wildfires here in the United States; a volcanic [...]
This page contains a schedule of all earthquakes that have occurred in recent days, in magnitudes ranging from 2.5 degrees and more than 4.5 http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/recenteqsww/Quakes/quakes_all.php