What is the cause of Earthquake

Causes of Earthquake
Rocks are composed of elastic but brittle material.
The elastic strain energy is stored in the rock during
the deformation that occur during the gigantic
tectonic plate actions that occur in the earth.
Due to its brittle nature, when the rock along a weak
region reach their strength , a sudden movement
takes place there, opposite side of the fault suddenly
slip and release the large strain energy stored in the
interface rocks.
This sudden slip of the fault causes earthquake.
What are the types of earthquake
 Types of Earthquake
Inter-Plate Earthquake - occur along the boundaries
of tectonic plates.
Intra-Plate Earthquake occur within the tectonic
plate away from plate boundaries.
 What is Fault
What are the types of Faults
 Faults
A Fault is a crack in the rocks where movement has taken
place when the rocks in their weak region reaches their
strength and slips suddenly.
Types of Faults
1. Dip Slip Fault Slip is in horizontal and vertical
directions
2. Strike slip Fault Slip is in lateral direction
 What is Seismic Waves
What are the types of seismic waves
 Seismic Waves
Large Strain Energy released during earthquake travels in all
direction through the earths layers as seismic waves.
Types of Seismic Waves
1. Body Wave
Primary Wave (P-Wave) (Compression and rarefaction along energy
transmission)
Secondary Wave (S-Wave) (oscillate in right angle to energy transmission)
2. Surface Wave
Love Wave (Similar to S-Wave with no vertical components)
Rayleigh Wave (Particle oscillates in elliptical path)
What is the instrument that measure
earthquake shaking
 Seismograph

Schematic view of Early Seismograph

What is accelerograms
The variation of ground acceleration with time
recorded at a point on ground during an earthquake is
called an accelerogram.
What is PGA
Peak amplitude (peak ground acceleration, PGA) is a
physically intuitive parameter. A horizontal PGA value of
0.6g (= 0.6 times the acceleration due to gravity)
suggests that the movement of the ground can cause a
maximum horizontal force on a rigid structure equal to
60% of its weight. In a rigid structure, all points in it
move with the ground by the same amount, and hence
experience the same maximum acceleration of PGA.
What is the relation between Focus,
Focal Depth and Epicenter
 Focus, Focal Depth and Epicenter
The point on the fault where slip starts is the Focus
or Hypocenter, and the point vertically above this on
the surface of the Earth is the Epicenter.

The depth of focus from the epicenter, called as Food

Depth, is an important parameter in determining the
damaging potential of an earthquake.

Distance from epicenter to any point of interest is

called epicentral distance.
 What is the difference between
magnitude and intensity of earthquake
 Magnitude and Intensity
Magnitude is a quantitative measure of the actual
size of the earthquake. Richter Scale has been
adopted as the magnitude scale
An increase in magnitude (M) by 1.0 implies 10 times
higher waveform amplitude and about 31 times
higher energy released
Intensity is a qualitative measure of the actual
shaking at a location during an earthquake.
Two commonly used ones are the Modified Mercalli
Intensity (MM!) Scale and the MSK Scale. Both scales
are quite similar and range from I (least perceptive)
to XII (most severe).
What is Isoseismals
The distribution of intensity at different places during
an earthquake is shown graphically using isoseismals ,
lines joining places with equal seismic intensity.