11 March 2011
Super Quake Spawns Massive Tsunami in Japan
Posted by Dan Satterfield
Update: Amazing video here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j3fUqdGXLbM
The strongest earthquake ever recorded in Japan struck at 0546 GMT Friday. It was 3:46 PM on a Friday afternoon and a massive tsunami struck minutes later. The damage you can see on TV (The BBC coverage is exc. as usual) but here is a little science behind why it happened.
Seismogram in Alaska records massive shake. It literally range the Earth like a bell. Click image for larger size.
Japan sits on top of three of the Earths Tectonic plates. Mount Fuji is were they meet. The large Pacific Plate is subducting under the Filipino and Eurasian plates. The image below has been annotated by me and is from a geology text book I have.
Where the quake hit in relation to the tectonic plates around Japan.
There is an excellent site at Penn State University, that explains how these large plates cause earthquakes and Tsunamis. Click the image below to learn more.
Click image to learn more.
Check out the other blogs on the AGU Blogosphere for more of the science behind this disaster. Geologist Callan Bentley on Mountain Beltway will certainly have info early Friday. Dave Petley in the UK already has info up on The Landslide Blog.
Dan Satterfield has worked as an on air meteorologist for 32 years in Oklahoma, Florida and Alabama. Forecasting weather is Dan's job, but all of Earth Science is his passion. This journal is where Dan writes about things he has too little time for on air. Dan blogs about peer-reviewed Earth science for Junior High level audiences and up.
Is it subducting under the Eurasian plate or the North American plate? The diagram seems to indicate the latter.
Very nice plate tectonic map -would like to see a detailed cross section of the subducting plate.
This is a great plate tectonic map inviting follow up.
Could you possibly show a detailed cross section of the subducting Pacific plate.
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