Planet earth lab 3
Introduction: Earthquakes occur when there is movement along a fault. The friction between rock masses rubbing against one another generates shock waves which travel through Earth. These shock waves (seismic waves) created by the earthquake are radiated in every direction from the focus, the point in the Earth where the actual movement takes place. An earthquake occurs every 30 seconds, day after day. Most of these are so weak they would go unnoticed without the use of sensitive modern instruments called seismographs.
Objective: You will learn about a real-life earthquake that occurring during the early 1800’s in the midsection of the United States. This earthquake occurred far away from modern-day plate boundaries and left scientists in a quandary as to why they occurred where they did.
Vocabulary
faults:
epicenter:
focus:
P-wave:
S-wave:
Procedure:
Watch the movie titled New Madrid Earthquakes that is found on Blackboard in Topic 3. After you watch the movie you are to write a summary that explains the most important parts of the movie. The summary must be between 250 and 500 words.
Discussion Questions: (Answer in complete sentences).
- What in the movie are scientists worried about. Be specific, give details.
- What did the scientists discover that caused them to worry (give the details, name the events, give statistics, name places, etc…)?
- How will modern day populations be affected by the geologic event that scientists are worried about?
- How will you and your family be affected by such an event?
