7th Grade Science

Earthquakes have the potential to destroy and cause a lot of harm or they just make the ground shake a little. Sometimes earthquakes with low magnitudes cause a lot of harm, and a high magnitude one causes a small amount of damage. This usually isn’t the case. Two Earthquakes with high magnitudes each caused a different amount of damage. These two are the earthquake that happened in Sumatra, Indonesia in December 26, 2004, and the earthquake that happened in Rat Island , Alaska in April 2, 1965.

About 4000 people were killed over 9000 that were injured that was this famous event you might ask? It was the loma prieta earthquake, also known as the world series earthquake. Taking place in san francisco 1898 this was one of the strongest earthquakes ever recorded in the bay area. This earthquake caused an estimate of 5.6 billion dollars for the total damage it had done .The person the was interviewed for this event was Mr.Demichel.he was about 10 when he felt the earthquake.

The San Francisco earthquake on April 18, 1906 was one of the most devastating earthquakes felt by a lot of states. At 5:15 am, this earthquake which registered at 8.25 on the Richter Scale shook San Francisco, California. The earthquake lasted less than a minute and it did a lot of destruction in that period of time. The most destructive part during the San Francisco earthquake was the fires which began after, as a result of the earthquake. The fires killed about 3,000 people and left 400,000 homeless (San Francisco Earthquake). The San Francisco earthquake epicenter was located near San Andreas fault and as a result, the damages caused by the earthquake was felt many miles along the San Andreas fault line. The city of San Francisco was known for its culture and economy, and because of the impact of the earthquake and fire, the city was in total disaster. Because of the magnitude of the earthquake and the amount of damage it did to the city of San Francisco, a lot of data and digital images have been collected so that it can be used for references and be displayed at its anniversary.

Earthquakes have afflicted the world since its inception. The sudden release of energy from volcanoes or displacing of earth plates can result in disasters of extreme magnitude. These usually naturally occurring phenomenon have been responsible from wiping out entire towns throughout history and until today continue to produce major loss of life and infrastructure. It can take years for a city or country to recover from a major event of this kind and when a third world country is involved, the result is usually exponentially worse than in a developed country. In the past decades Japan, Chile and Haiti have suffered the devastation an earthquake produces. This document will concentrate in Haiti, a small country in the Caribbean. On

The January 12, 2010 Haiti Earthquake caused an enormous destruction in the Caribbean nation. Hospitals and government buildings collapsed along with an unbelievable amount of homes. Tens of thousands of people were killed, and many more were wounded. The disaster added more misery to people already struggling to get by with everyday life. Haiti is one of the poorest nations in the world. The January 12 quake demolished almost every major building in Port-au-Prince, Haiti's capital. About 5,000 schools in the city were destroyed or damaged. Throughout Haiti, more than 220,000 people were killed, and more than 1 million were left homeless. A few days after the quake, the number of survivors stood at 121 as hopes of finding more became

On August 24, 2014 a magnitude 6.0 earthquake occurred in and around the city of Napa, CA. The earthquake killed one person and injured over 150 people. And these people were treated at Queen of the Valley Medical Center in Napa [1]. More and more earthquakes occurred on this earth. So this grasps people’s attention.

Lasting less than a minute, the immediate impact of the earthquake was disastrous. The earthquake also lead to several fires around the city that burned for three days and destroyed nearly 500 city blocks (archives.gov).The earthquake and fires killed an estimated 3,000

On April 18, 1906, an earthquake occurred in San Francisco with a magnitude of 7.9. The earthquake was caused by the San Andreas Fault since the San Andreas Fault slip over a segment. The earthquake could be felt from Oregon to southern California. Buildings in San Francisco was destroyed by earthquake and fires. Fires started after the earthquake occurred and firefighters were not able to stop the fire because the water mains were broken and because of this, firestorms started to develop around San Francisco. Then, the San Francisco Mayor E.E. Schmitz called the U.S. Army troops to shoot anyone that is found looting. While the army was doing that, firefighters and U.S. troops tried to fight the fire by dynamiting the city to create firewalls.

California, and thus San Francisco, lies on the San Andres fault. The earthquake was caused when this fault suddenly shifted, with the rupture spreading for a total of 476 kilometres in northward and southward direction. “This fault is a continental transform fault, which forms part of the tectonic boundary between the North American Plate and the Pacific Plate.” (1906 Earthquake: How long was the 1906 Crack? USGS Earthquake Hazards Program – Northern California, Accessed September 3, 2006). 1 The distance of the fault is of about 1300 kilometres, which runs the length of California from Cape Mendocino in the north to the Salton Sea in the south. Geologists have estimated that the fault moved as quickly as 2.74 kilometres per second. The San Andreas Fault, the source of this disaster, lies ten miles or deeper, at the meeting point of two tectonic plates, the Pacific and the North American. “The right-lateral strike-slip fault is characterized by mainly lateral motion in a dextral sense, where the western plate (Pacific plate) moves northward relative to the eastern plate (North American

According to the court clerk of the U.S. District Court of San Francisco, the earthquake lasted around a minute, however that minute was enough to inflict one of the most devastating disasters in United States history. The earthquake was felt from Oregon to Las Angeles as well as Nevada with the epicenter occurring 2 miles away from San Francisco in the Pacific Ocean. The quake resulted in water mains and gas lines breakages, and the fires raged unchecked which spread to over 500 blocks in San Francisco. Although the earthquake of 1906 is known as the San Francisco earthquake, the cities of Santo Rosa and San Jose were affected as well and lost much of their infrastructure.

The San-Francisco earthquake caused quite a lot of damage in the area, but what is an earthquake? An earthquake is the movement of tectonic plates along a transform boundary and what plate is California sitting on? The Pacific Plate which is not connected to the North American plate and the plate boundary is a transform boundary. Earthquakes occur so often there that people say it is like a rainstorm that is ignored. The place where the Pacific Plate is grinding along with the North American Plate is called the San Andreas Fault. As stated before the earthquake had a magnitude of 7.8 which caused so much destruction a fire broke out. Nobody really knows where the fire started but it burned for 7 days and scorched over 500 city blocks leaving the once proud and powerful city into dust. The combination of the earthquake and fire is said to have killed “ Over 700 deaths by the earthquake and fire is now believed to be an understatement the total loss of life by a factor of 3 or 4.” (The Great 1906 San-Francisco Earthquake.)

The damages were catastrophic as houses lay in ruin and debris littered the roads. There were mudslides and fallen rocks that paved the roads and made them impassible for vehicles to get through. Ultimately by the roads being clogged up the response time by rescue workers and essential personal were hampered. This also made it exceptionally difficult for supplies to be rushed to the locations for the earthquake survivors. As some were digging and excavating for survivors they were being halted by aftershocks and falling debris from above. Approximately 8000 people were killed either by their houses caving in or by the other disasters this earthquake triggered. It was a real life tragedy that

Not only did the Earthquake of 64? claim the lives of around 131 people in Alaska alone as well as 16 deaths between Oregon and California. For an earthquake this size, the death toll was actually quite small, but this was due to the low population, the time of day in which it occurred as well as the fact it was a holiday. It also caused about $2.3 billion, in property damages. Luckily due to wood frame construction, as well as low-rise structures and the modesty urban density, this helped to limit the fatalities. As a result of the earthquake there were several ground fissures and failures that caused major structural damage, as well as property damage. One of the towns greatly affected by the event was Anchorage. They suffered severe losses such as homes, buildings, streets, sidewalks, electrical systems, among other things. Additionally, the Port of Valdez was affected by a major landslide. In the collapse of the city harbor, the docks, and the ship that was docked, 30 people perished. Coincidentally, during this time, a 27 foot tsunami tore though the village of Chenega, which resulted in the

     Floods and fires are also caused by earthquakes. Floods arise from tsunamis along coast lines, from large-scale seiches in enclosed bodies of water such as lakes and canals, and from the failure of dams. Fire produced the greatest property loss following the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, when 521 blocks in the city center burned uncontrollably for three days. Fire also followed the 1923 Tokyo earthquake, causing much damage and hardship for the citizens.

It seems that the earthquake brought a trail of things that happen later. So we can learn for this that physical geography and human geography are connected and affects each other almost every time.