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Anticipating Earthquakes
dnahelix writes "Science @ NASA reports 'High above Earth where seismic waves never reach, satellites may be able to detect earthquakes--before they strike.'"
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These quakes are like, sooooo psychadelic, man.
Mother, do you think they'll like this sig?
We had a small earthquake a while ago, and about a minute before it happened my miniature pinscher jumped on my back and woke me up. If a single minpin can predict an earthquake a minute before it happens then a beowulf cluster of 1024 minpins could give people several hours notice.
Slashdotter are stupid and biased.
Ever heard about the Northern Appalachian Seismic Zone?
It's just not as densely populated as California.
"...with a likely chance of showers. Tomorrow's forecast also includes a 20% chance of EarthQuakes on the 7.0 scale. Watch out Los Angeles, you could have a shaky morning. Phil." "That's right Tom, and speaking of shaky mornings, here's Wolf with the sports..."
Jason Lotito
The idea is for everyone to have a (precious) few minutes to get to shelter, clear off the roads, etc. That's all. Think of it like the tornado warnings in the central part of the U.S. When the siren goes off, everyone knows it's time to head for the cellar...
Who knows when the next Quake is coming? What will probably happen is that they'll predict a date but when the date arrives the Quake will be nowhere to be seen and then the Quake people will announce another date that may or may not be accurate.
Mother, do you think they'll like this sig?
I dunno, I thought there was somewhat of a history of quakes around the mississippi. They happen less frequently but on a larger scale or something.
d rid/Charleston1895.gif
Check out this image of damage done by similar quakes: http://quake.wr.usgs.gov/prepare/factsheets/NewMa
Morphing Software
'High above the internet where packets never reach, satellites may be able to detect the slashdot effect--before it strikes.'
If the TV comes on with the news, and the reporter says, "NASA has recored that we are goning to enter a 6.0 sized earthquake in 1 hour" everyone is going to panic. Then criminals know that people are going to run away from there home. So they go and steal. As all the scared people run (because they a lot of trust in NASA) they get in traffice jams, there are tons of car crashes, roits start on the road, and then people start to fight. But wait! NASA was mistaken. There new system had a little flaw in it..oops
they can also predict the slashdot effect then ?
When will I end this grieving ? When will my future begin ?
"The planet does not revolve around the US. There are many places where earthquakes are a major part of everyday life."
You are absolutely correct. The problem is that this article is coming from NASA, and last I checked, NASA is a US government agency. So, we'll be using our resources and spending our money to develop a technology that we'll probably be nice enough to let the rest of the world use. So read about the San Andreas fault and say thank you.
"`Ford, you're turning into a penguin. Stop it.'" -Douglas Adams, THHGTTG
The questions have been solved. Emergency managers on the US east and gulf coasts (and, I assume, their counterparts in other nations affected by tropical cyclones) have plenty of experience running evacuations without causing the collapse of civilization.
This of course assumes several days notice. If only hours or minutes are available, a tornado siren approach would be more effective.
But then again, I could be wrong.
...before they strike.
This is a follow up to a previous program that was predicting them after they struck. Just last year they managed to predict the 1906 San Francisco Quake with amazing accuracy, and results like that are money in the bank for further research.
The Japanese system envisages, ultimately, being able to give a few minutes' warning, and that should be enough to save the majority of deaths. (Of course, the warning consists of gathering a bunch of learned people who learnedly pool their various thoughts on the matter, and get it wrong, in a learned manner, but the concept's reasonable.)
Having been in a couple of interesting earthquakes in Japan and the US, if someone gives me a 3-minute warning, I'm happy to go stand in the local park for 20 minutes.
And not all cultures loot after an earthquake, but here I'll obviously agree that NASA, spending US taxpayer's money, should clearly focus on the US population.
The nice moire pattern in the photo showing changes in elevation was from after the quake. It does a nice job of showing how the stress along the fault was released at this point during a quake, but isn't directly a lot of help in predicting anything. However, one would assume that if you looked at similar photos along a known fault for long enough, there would be areas that did not show any colorfull moire patterns, surrounded by lots of color (indicating movement in the fault). Pretty cool, but I think most of the major faults already have this information from ground measurements.
The "60% chance of earthquakes in the next two days" portion of the prediction seems to rely on some piezo electric effect detected via magnetometers and thermal imaging. This has been speculated about for at least a couple of decades now, but I guess the signal to noise ratio is pretty bad since they haven't declared success yet. Maybe QuakeSat, mentioned at the end of the article, will provide enough comprehensive data to make some useful predictions. Predicting 12 out of the last 3 earthquakes isn't going to win you any friends!
Sort-term earthquake prediction- hours to weeks- is pyschologically comforting, but not that important in saving lives or property. One needs to predict the maximum likely earthquake force in a neighborhood in order to properly contruct buildings and roads to last for at least 30 years and save lives. In this area the USGS and State Geologic Surveys have made great progress. Case in point: The 1994 Northridge, California earthquake and 1995 Kobe, Japan were the same magnitude, yet the second killed ONE HUNDRED TIMES more people than the first. The success of the Northridge quake was partially attributed to luck and partly to that Los Angeles had more newer buildings than Japan that had implemented the more serious construction codes. It is tragic that M5 quakes that barely spill coffee in San Jose, California, but level mud-brick buildings and kill hundreds in some third world country.
I've been in three near M7 quakes in California and I can testify how psychologically traumatic a sudden quake is. Short term prediction would be comforting. It would also save some lives in large buildings like schools and stadiums (even though the 1989 San Francisco quake happended during a Wolrd Series baseball game without fatallity). And in reving up rescue crews.
If you are interested in knowing more about earthquake hazards, but you're not a seismologist, check out Earthshaking Science by Susan Hough. She works for the U.S. Geological Survey. She first discusses the basics of determining earthquake hazard, then discusses the currently estimated hazard in various regions in the United States. She's not optimisitic about specific earthquake prediction, but she thinks that we can improve our estimates of longer-term hazards. These estimates are critical for guiding hazard-mitigation efforts (building codes, for example).
A good number of volcanoes - such as those on Hawaii, are fitted with tiltmeters and laser-ranging reflectors.
As magma moves up towards the surface, some volcanoes start to 'inflate', bulging outwards. By measuring changes in tilt, and the geometry of the mountain, vulcanologists can get some warning of the changes under the mountain.
They usually combine this with seismic evidence (that moving magma creates swarms of tiny 'quakes), changes in gas production and the like to try and predict eruptions.
However, volcanoes are just as unpredictable. The USGS made a series of predictions about the Long Valley Caldera in Eastern California. It is an ENORMOUS crater which is underlain by an active magma chamber. The last volcanic activity in the region was about 400 years ago, and it is likely to continue into the future. Slap bang in the middle of Long Valley is the Mammoth Mountain ski resort, built around a dormant volcano.
In the early 1980s, the area around Mammoth Mountain began to bulge, molten rock was being forced upwards, there were swarms of 'quakes, trees began dying as CO2 bubbled up from underground. The USGS cautiously announced that they expected Mammoth Mountain to become active in the near future.
It didn't. The area remains highly active, but doomsday was put off for now.
BTW. if you ever get a chance to go to Mammoth Mountain, Long Valley and the Inyo Craters, do take it - the landscape is simply awe-inspiring.
Another example is Pozzuoli, which lies West of Naples in an area known as the Phlaegrean Fields. This is another colossal caldera with an active magma chamber. The last eruption was in 1538 when a new mountain (called Monte Nuovo somewhat unoriginally) was formed, the crater of Solfatara is still somewhat active, disgorging water and sulphurous fumes.
Pozzuoli is in the the middle of the Fields, a nice seaside town with some Roman ruins. However, during the 1970s, the area began to be shaken by hundreds of 'quakes a day. Even more worryingly, the area began to bulge upwards, sometimes by a centimetre a day! The Italian government ordered the evacuation of the entire city for several years, fearing another massive eruption. Eventually, the bulge subsided, the 'quakes faded and the people went back. But millions had been spent and enormous social dislocation caused.
It's quiet there at the moment, so everyone is looking East, over Naples to Vesuvius, which has been suspiciously quiet for far too long now.
Best wishes,
Mike.