What does a Magnitude mean when a earthquake happens?
819467
"magnitude" is at which the scale the earthquake has devastated the region.
724384
There are way too many variables to answer this question appropriately.  i.e. the quake magnitude, the depth of the epicenter, the soil underlying the structure, the rock underlying the structure, the components of the structure - material types (3000 psi concrete vs. 8000 psi concrete, the location and amount of re-bar, the type of footing - spread footings vs piles), if any sort of seismic fitting has been to the structure - addition of dampeners or springs, the list goes on....
946669
Earthquakes 10.5 are impossibly big.  Places in America where you get earthquakes as big as 9 only happen along the coast of Alaska.  The biggest earthquake that can happen on the San Andreas is about 8.  Volcanoes in the US are only related to some faults, not all, and they are not interconnected, so one eruption is not related to nor does it cause another.\n\nHere are some basics on earthquakes/volcanism to help you with why this is physically impossible:\n\nEarthquakes: \nIt all comes down to stress and strain from the interaction of different plates, chiefly at the boundaries. It is not 'the plates rubbing together' as many people say; or at least that's a very simplistic view.\n\nPlate tectonics causes stress on the continents and oceans, all over the surface of the earth. In some places, the stress is very small (usually within the plates). Elsewhere, the stress is high, usually where the plates meet each other. Since each plate moves, when two come in contact, the stress each other. They can push on each other and cause compressional stress, they can pull with extensional stress, and they can slide past or shear each other with tensional stress.\n\nFaulting, causing earthquakes, comes from the fact that this stress is building up all the time, but rocks and continents are strong materials. Just like hitting a rock with a small hammer, you do put stress on it, but a small amount. It would take a sledgehammer to put enough strain (effects and accumulation of stress) to build up and cause breakage. In the earth, the area around an active fault builds up strain from the stress of plate tectonics. Most faults become locked, because of this strength, and thus can not release their strain. Away from the fault, the stress produces very small and slow movement of the rock masses as a whole. Eventually, the strain is too much and the rest of the plate has moved too far and the fault releases the strain build-up all at once in a big stress release called an earthquake. This is called the elastic rebound theory, and it explains most (but not all) movements.\n\nThis is why an earthquake's size is relative to the fault size. The bigger the fault, the bigger the strain build up, and the bigger the release in an earthquake. Subduction zones and collision zones, where large portions of plates actually can rub together as a whole, have the really big earthquakes, like the 2004 Sumatra earthquake. In other plate boundaries, the entire plate boundary does not act together, so the faults become spread out and many faults take up the strain from the tectonic stress, like with the San Andreas Fault in California (it only takes up ~3/4 of the stress between the plates).\n\nEarthquakes are really tricky things; there is still so much we need to learn. As of now, there is no way to predict them, but we can say where the danger is highest and about how long between events.\n\nVolcanoes:\nThere are several processes in Plate Tectonics that cause volcanism, but they result in two main types of volcanism.\n\nVolcanism in subduction is caused by volitals, like H2O, CO2. These are carried down by the plate, mainly in the form of weak minerals. These minerals break down with pressure and temperature into stronger minerals that don't contain water and carbon dioxide. The leftover gases and liquids travel into the mantle (the mantle wedge) and hydrate the mantle, causing melting. The melt rises and then... volcano!\n\nThe other main cause is from rising mantle material, which forms decompression melting. Basically, hot mantle is kept from melting by the pressure of the earth at depth. When this material rises, the pressure drops much faster than the temperature, and thus it partially melts. This mainly occurs at divergent boundaries and hot spots, which are areas in plate tectonics that have rising materials or spreading.
565481
Because the primary 'earthquake' is measurable by a physical realignment of two or more techtonic plates in a specific direction. 'aftershocks' are incremental settlements of these plates, and are not necessarily in he same direction.  Hope that helps!
258013
What kind of activities do they perform?  Perhaps you're confused about the definition of "epicenter."  An earthquake's epicenter is point on the earth's surface directly above the point where an earthquake or other underground explosion originates.
196324
try using geophysics book as your reference.\np (primary) waves travel on solid, liquid and gas mediums.\nS (shear) waves travel only on solid mediums.\nA proof of this, is an occurrence of earthquakes, is which the quake produces seismic waves and the seismic centers can measure this waves and telling the magnitude of an earthquake.\nIf the earth is hollow, they (siesmologists) couldn't measure the magnitude of earthquakes.
31391
An earthquake is a sudden and sometimes catastrophic movement of a part of the Earth's surface. Earthquakes result from the dynamic release of elastic strain energy that radiates seismic waves. Earthquakes typically result from the movement of faults, planar zones of deformation within the Earth's upper crust. The word earthquake is also widely used to indicate the source region itself. The Earth's lithosphere is a patch work of plates in slow but constant motion (see plate tectonics). Earthquakes occur where the stress resulting from the differential motion of these plates exceeds the strength of the crust. The highest stress (and possible weakest zones) are most often found at the boundaries of the tectonic plates and hence these locations are where the majority of earthquakes occur. Events located at plate boundaries are called interplate earthquakes; the less frequent events that occur in the interior of the lithospheric plates are called intraplate earthquakes (see, for example, New Madrid Seismic Zone). Earthquakes related to plate tectonics are called tectonic earthquakes. Most earthquakes are tectonic, but they also occur in volcanic regions and as the result of a number of anthropogenic sources, such as reservoir induced seismicity, mining and the removal or injection of fluids into the crust. Seismic waves including some strong enough to be felt by humans can also be caused by explosions (chemical or nuclear), landslides, and collapse of old mine shafts, though these sources are not strictly earthquakes.\n\nThere's too much details so just click on the link,\ni hope this helps.
1059131
In the sense of an earthquake, yeah.  That's what it is.  A wave of earth moving out from the central point of origin.  That has nothing to do with the wave-particle duality.  In fact, it's best not to think of it as an actual wave or an actual particle (like a billiard ball).
250606
Richter Scale is not a machine. It is the system used to measure the strength of an earthquake. Developed by Charles Richter in 1935 as a means of categorizing local earthquakes. It is a collection of mathematical formulas; it is not a physical device. It is a logarithmic scale for measuring earthquake magnitude which means that, a magnitude 7.0 earthquake generates 10 times larger amplitude waves than those of a magnitude 6.0, and releases 32 times more energy. The machine that measures earthquakes is called a Seismograph.
204103
earthquakes happen because the earth plates are always moving , sometimes they move gently and we cant even feel them but sometimes they move violently causing a earthquake also they are the reason we have volcanos ....
752488
Here are the statistics on magnitude of earthquakes, and the number of quakes at each magnitudes, annually.  These records are averages since the year 1900.\n\nGreat, 8 and higher: 1\nMajor,  7 - 7.9:  17\nStrong,  6 - 6.9:  134\nModerate,  5 - 5.9:  1319\nLight,  4 - 4.9:  13,000\nMinor,  3 - 3.9:  130,000\nVery Minor,  2 - 2.9:  1,300,000
1044728
The foci of earthquakes at transform boundaries tend to be at shallow depths.\n\nSee source.
687169
Richter Magnitude Scale
1037668
island girl is not totally correct. earthquakes occur when two plates fault, as in one plate goes up and the other goes down, thus making vibration and it is released in P-waves. \ncold air is denser than warm air. cold air goes under the warm air and makes it rise into the sky, this produces condensation. clouds form and inside these clouds are either condensation nuclei or rain nuclei (not sure of the name) when these nuclei finally fuse together they get heavy and form into a rain drop, there are millions of nuclei in a raindrop, so they get to heavy and they fall and depending on temperature, they can freeze and turn into snow or hail. sleet is just a liquidy kind of snow that forms on the ground. snow and water in one. i hope i answered your question and its udnerstandable.
855026
Most earthquakes happen along the edge of the oceanic and continental plates. [Oceanic plates are under water, continental plates are above.] The earth's crust (the outer layer of the planet) is made up of a bunch of pieces, called plates. The plates get moved around by the liquid layers of magma underneath the Earth's crust. The plates are always bumping into each other, and pulling away from each other or past eachother. Earthquakes usually happen when two plates are running into each other or sliding past each other. They can also happen along faults, too though.
1089007
is this what your talking about\n\n\nAn 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.\n\nEarthquakes 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\n\nEarth (often referred to as "The Earth") is the third planet in the solar system in terms of distance from the Sun, and the fifth in order of size. It is the largest of its planetary system's terrestrial planets and the only place in the universe currently known to support life. The Earth was formed around 4.57 billion (4.57×109)[1] years ago (see Age of the Earth) and its largest natural satellite, the Moon, was orbiting it shortly thereafter, around 4.533 billion years ago.\n\nSince it formed, the Earth has evolved through geologic and biological processes so that any traces of the original conditions have been virtually eliminated. The outer surface is divided into several tectonic plates that gradually migrate across the surface over geologic time spans. The interior of the planet remains active, with a thick layer of molten mantle and an iron core that generates a magnetic field. The atmospheric conditions have been significantly altered by the presence of life forms, which create an ecological balance that modifies the surface conditions. About 70% of the surface is presently covered in salt water oceans, and the remainder consists of continents and islands.\n\nThere is significant interaction between the Earth and the space environment. The relatively large Moon provides ocean tides and has gradually modified the length of the planet's rotation period. A cometary bombardment during the early history of the planet is believed to have formed the oceans. Later, asteroid impacts are understood to have caused significant changes to the surface environment. Changes in the orbit of the planet may also be responsible for the ice ages that have covered significant portions of the surface in glacial sheets.\n\nThe Earth does not have another natural orbiting body other than the Moon, although Cruithne has been erroneously described as such. Cruithne was discovered in 1986 and follows an elliptical orbit around the Sun at about the same average orbital radius as the Earth. However, from the point of view of the moving Earth, Cruithne follows a horseshoe orbit around the Sun that avoids close proximity with the Earth.
281760
This is probably because most large earthquakes occur very deep in the Earth (along subducted plate contacts) so they register with low amplitudes at the surface. But if a large earthquake happens near the surface, it will have a larger amplitude and likely a long duration compared to smaller earthquakes. The longer duration can be due to more energy which generates larger sizes and larger quantities of waves that can resonate, interfere with one another and reflect off of geologic surfaces to prolong the quake..