Prevention Of Damage From Earthquakes

Although at this point in time there is nothing that can be done to stop earthquakes happening, there are many things that can be done to reduce the damage of earthquakes and all the effects it has on people and places. As soon as an earthquake hits, the local fire and police departments should be ready to go and help the people escape and put out the fires. The damage should be reported to government agencies and they should set up a team to respond with rescue and recovery operations. Shelter needs to be set up for the people who have lost their homes. They should be provided with food, clean water and medical assistance.
Earthquake-proof buildings should be built in areas where earthquakes are a risk. These buildings are much stronger than normal buildings and are able to stand up to the shaking ground made by earthquakes. They are built with special technology that has materials to withstand earthquakes. They are not 100% effective but are proven to be much stronger than normal buildings in the event of an earthquake.
Sources
http://www.ncree.gov.tw/eng/4_edu/Brochure_Earthquake_Disaster_Prevention.pdf
http://www.odec.ca/projects/2006/thom6d2/earthquakeresistant.htm
http://www.who.int/mediacentre/news/releases/2008/pr13/en/index.html
http://mceer.buffalo.edu/research/international_research/ANCER/Members/ou_jp_edpmrc_center.pdf
http://www.teara.govt.nz/EarthSeaAndSky/NaturalHazardsAndDisasters/Earthquakes/4/en

San Andreas Fault

This is a video from youtube telling you about the San Andreas fault:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tdSAPxHIKCM

Long-Term Effects of Earthquakes

One of the long-term effects of an earthquake is the cost of the damages to buildings and other structures. This causes a lot of damage to the local economy because businesses are forced to pay for new buildings or shut down. They also suffer from the lack of infrastructure that has resulted because of the earthquake. Roads take a long time to rebuild which means a lot of businesses shut down. Some earthquakes cause dams to collapse. These dams cost a lot of money and can often take a very long time to rebuild.
In less economically developed countries earthquakes result in loss of homes, crops and livestock and people cannot support themselve and can dye of starvation. Aswell as this, in LEDCs if the earthquake results in deaths, the bodies could be left out for a period of time, which could spread diseases causing more deaths.
The lack of water and food also causes diseases to spread quickly and people to dye of starvation or dehydration. Another long-term effect an earthquake can have on the local economy is a rapid decline of tourism due to flooding, destruction and people may think it could happen again.
Sources
http://www.iiasa.ac.at/Research/RMS/july2000/Papers/chang3006.pdf
http://www.hinduonnet.com/fline/fl1627/16270870.htm
http://www.iiasa.ac.at/Research/RMS/july2000/Papers/kajitani0201.pdf
http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/gcsebitesize/geography/platetectonics/earthquakesrev_print.shtml
http://earthquake.usgs.gov/learning/faq.php?categoryID=8&faqID=100

Short-Term Effects Of Earthquakes

Earthquakes cause a lot of damage, I will try to go through some of the short-term effects earthquakes have on the world. The effects of the ground shaking by earthquakes usually leads to the destruction of structures such as buildings, bridges and dams. This means that people still in buildings, on roads or under bridges can be seriously injured or killed. They could be killed by structures collapsing on them, glass shattering and hitting people, fires resulting from the earthquake and many other ways that are caused by earthquakes. Earthquakes also trigger landslides, which can also injure and kill people as well as block rivers and cause them to flood surrounding towns and cities. Earthquakes that take place under the ocean can sometimes cause Tsunamis or tidal waves. Tsunamis are giant waves of water which travel very fast. They are known for destroying entire populations and cities on the coast.

This is a picture of a coastal town after the destruction that came with a tsunami caused by an under water earthquake:














http://images.google.ie/imgres?imgurl=http://mutiny.files.wordpress.com/2007/03/tsunami.jpg&imgrefurl=http://mutiny.in/author/angel/page/2/&usg=__LF3tplP96wZcKv_myt3l4n40OpM=&h=375&w=500&sz=367&hl=en&start=90&um=1&tbnid=HXCJ5PG8AbNlmM:&tbnh=98&tbnw=130&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dtsunami%26ndsp%3D20%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DN%26start%3D80%26um%3D1
Sources:
http://library.thinkquest.org/16132/html/quakeinfo/effects.html
http://www.uky.edu/KGS/geologichazards/eqeffects.htm
http://www.seismo.unr.edu/ftp/pub/louie/class/100/mercalli.html
http://library.thinkquest.org/16132/html/quakeinfo/effects.html
http://www.geography.learnontheinternet.co.uk/topics/earthquakesintro.html

Why Earthquakes Happen

An Earthquake is caused by a release of energy from the Earth's crust. This energy can be generated by many different things including dislocation of plates of the crust, manmade explosives and a volcanic erruption. The Earth's crust is split up into many plates which move because of convection currents in the Earth's mantle which are cause by the warm material rising and then cooling and sinking down. The earthquakes that cause most damage are usually caused by dislocation of plates of the Earth's crust.

The crust can sometimes bend and snap because as the Earth's plates on the crust to not have straight edges, the uneven surfaces where two plates meet often crack and break off causing seismic waves which are vibrations. These waves travel outward from the source of the earthquake at varying speeds depending on the material they are travelling through.

A fault is a fracture in the Earth's crust where two plates have slipped towards each other, away from each other or side by side. Earthquakes often reoccur along fault lines because they show where two plates meet and therefore where the weak spots of the crust are.

Sources:
http://www.iris.edu/edu/onepagers/no2.pdf
http://pubs.usgs.gov/gip/earthq1/how.html
http://www.windows.ucar.edu/tour/link=/earth/interior/how_plates_move.html

http://www.geo-world.org/earthquake/
http://earthquake.usgs.gov/learning/

This is a picture of the San Andreas fault line:

http://www.ussartf.org/images/san_andreas.gif

Welcome

Hi, this is my blog about earthquakes. I will explain why earthquakes happen and what they can cause. I hope my blog will give you the information you are looking for. Please leave comments if you have any questions, I will answer as soon as possible.