Causes of Earthquakes
Most earthquakes are causally related to compressional or tensional stresses built up at the margins of the huge moving lithospheric plates that make up the earth's surface (see lithosphere). The immediate cause of most shallow earthquakes is the sudden release of stress along a fault, or fracture in the earth's crust, resulting in movement of the opposing blocks of rock past one another. These movements cause vibrations to pass through and around the earth in wave form, just as ripples are generated when a pebble is dropped into water. Volcanic eruptions, rockfalls, landslides, and explosions can also cause a quake, but most of these are of only local extent. Shock waves from a powerful earthquake can trigger smaller earthquakes in a distant location hundreds of miles away if the geologic conditions are favorable.
2006-07-18 01:59:26
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answer #1
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answered by Anonymous
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For plate boundaries, the plates are moving against each other, and sometimes the edges of them get hung up and stick. Earthquakes happen when the part that sticks suddenly moves.
It's like taking two pieces of half-dried out Play dough or clay and moving them past on another. Some of it moves smoothly, but some of it catches on one another so you have to push harder to make it move.
For mountains, it's a matter of uplift and weathering. Mountains are like ice bergs - part of them stick up above the ground, but there's a lot of it that you don't see that's underground. As they slowly erode down because of rain, snow, and wind, they rise up because they're floating on a sea of magma.
So the stresses of uplift causes the mountains to crack and shift, and these cause earthquakes. If you listen to ice melting in a glass of water, you can hear the cracking and shifting. It's the same with mountains.
Naturally formed ice is considered a type of rock, you know. So it stands to reason that it'd act similarly.
2006-07-18 02:02:57
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answer #2
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answered by Cassie 3
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Plate boundaries feel the move more than plate center. Folded mountains may have outlets that release enormous energy from down below.
2006-07-18 02:01:08
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answer #3
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answered by Kanda 5
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the fast answer is that earthquakes are led to by capacity of faulting, a unexpected lateral or vertical circulate of rock alongside a rupture (injury) floor. right here is the longer answer: the exterior of the Earth is in non-stop sluggish action. it extremely is plate tectonics--the action of substantial inflexible plates on the exterior of the Earth consistent with flow of rock interior the Earth. The plates conceal the total floor of the globe. considering the fact that they are all moving they rub against one yet another in some places (like the San Andreas Fault in California), sink below one yet another in others (like the Peru-Chile Trench alongside the western border of South u . s . a . of america), or unfold different than for one yet another (like the Mid-Atlantic Ridge). At such places the action isn't gentle--the plates are caught mutually on the sides yet something of each plate is continuing to flow, so the rocks alongside the sides are distorted (what we call "stress"). because of the fact the action maintains, the stress builds as much as the component the place the rock can not face up to any further bending. With a lurch, the rock breaks and the two aspects flow. An earthquake is the shaking that radiates out from the breaking rock.
2016-12-14 09:40:00
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answer #4
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answered by Anonymous
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An earthquake is a phenomenon that results from and is powered by the sudden release of stored energy that radiates seismic waves. At the Earth's surface, earthquakes may manifest themselves by a shaking or displacement of the ground and sometimes tsunamis, which may lead to loss of life and destruction of property.Earthquakes may occur naturally or as a result of human activities. In its most generic sense, the word earthquake is used to describe any seismic event—whether a natural phenomenon or an event caused by humans—that generates seismic waves.
2006-07-18 01:59:07
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answer #5
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answered by GuardianCy 3
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Aaaaahhhhhh - because it is near the folded mountains and plate's boundaries - D'UH
2006-07-18 01:56:04
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answer #6
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answered by jonnygaijin 5
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