Normal Fault. Blocks are pulled apart
Thrust Fault. Blocks are pushed together
Strike-Slip Fault. Blocks slide past each other
Geologists have found that earthquakes tend to reoccur along faults, which reflect zones of weakness in the Earth’s crust. Even if a fault zone has recently experienced an earthquake, however, there is no guarantee that all the stress has been relieved. Another earthquake could still occur. In New Madrid, a great earthquake was followed by a large aftershock within 6 hours on December 16, 1811. Furthermore, relieving stress along one part of the fault may increase stress in another part; the New Madrid earthquakes in January and February 1812 may have resulted from this phenomenon.
The focal depth of an earthquake is the depth from the Earth’s surface to the region where an earthquake’s energy originates (the focus). Earthquakes with focal depths from the surface to about 70 kilometers (43.5 miles) are classified as shallow. Earthquakes with focal depths from 70 to 300 kilometers (43.5 to 186 miles) are classified as intermediate. The focus of deep earthquakes may reach depths of more than 700 kilometers (435 miles). The focuses of most earthquakes are concentrated in the crust and upper mantle. The depth to the center of the Earth’s core is about 6,370 kilometers (3,960 miles), so even the deepest earthquakes originate in relatively shallow parts of the Earth’s interior.
The epicenter of an earthquake is the point on the Earth’s surface directly above the focus. The location of an earthquake is commonly described by the geographic position of its epicenter and by its focal depth.
Earthquakes beneath the ocean floor sometimes generate immense sea waves or tsunamis (Japan’s dread “huge wave”). These waves travel across the ocean at speeds as great as 960 kilometers per hour (597 miles per hour) and may be 15 meters (49 feet) high or higher by the time they reach the shore. During the 1964 Alaska earthquake, tsunamis engulfing coastal areas caused most of the destruction at Kodiak, Cordova, and Seward and caused severe damage along the west coast of North America, particularly at Crescent City, Calif. Some waves raced across the ocean to the coasts of Japan.