Any sudden movement of part of the crust of the earth, due to a natural cause, produces a trembling or shaking called an earthquake. Though earthquakes are generally classed among the most terrifying of all natural phenomena, those which have occurred during human historic times have had scarcely any geological or topographical effects of real consequence on the face of the earth. Locally, the effects may be notable and the destruction of life and property may be great. The earth may be locally cracked and rent, small fault scarps may develop, landslides and avalanches may result from the shaking of the earth, buildings may be demolished, and sea waves may be rolled upon the land. On the other hand, many earthquakes, called “tremors,” are too slight to be noticed by people, though they are recorded by specially constructed instruments called “seismographs.” We have already stated that actual sudden displacements causing earthquakes have amounted to twenty or even fifty feet right along fault fractures, but during the vibrations or quakings, which are often so destructively sent out into the neighboring country, the earth’s surface rarely actually moves more than a small fraction of an inch. Because of the suddenness of the movement objects on the surface may be moved inches or even feet. Violent shocks may last one or two minutes and cause the whole earth to tremble, though at distant points only seismographs record the movement. It is probably true that some part of the earth is shaking all the time.
Studies during the last fifty years have made it certain that the main cause of earthquakes is the sudden slipping of earth blocks past each other along fault fractures, the sudden slipping furnishing the impulse which sends out the vibrations into the surrounding more or less elastic crust of the earth. The low rumbling to roaring sound, which sometimes immediately precedes an earthquake, is probably due to the grinding of the rocks together below the surface.
Earthquakes generally accompany volcanic outbursts of the violent or explosive type, and in such cases subterranean explosions cause both the eruptions and the quakings of the earth. It is well known that the principal volcanic districts or belts of the earth are also the belts of most frequent earthquakes, but this does not mean that volcanic action causes most of the earthquakes. Active volcanoes and earthquakes are so commonly associated in the same belts because those belts no doubt represent portions of the crust which are now most actively yielding to the forces directly resulting from the shrinkage of the earth. Within the volcanic belts many earthquakes take place unaccompanied by any volcanic action, and many others take place far from volcanoes. Some earthquakes have been caused by the impact of great landslides or avalanches, or by the sudden caving in of underground openings.
Brief descriptions of a few typical carefully studied earthquakes during recent years will serve to make the main features of earthquakes still clearer to the reader.
The violent Japanese earthquake of 1891 was caused by the sinking of a block of earth forty miles long from two to thirty feet below that on the other side of a fault fracture. There was also considerable horizontal shifting, and cracks developed in the adjacent region. A distinct fault scarp, fifteen to twenty feet high, developed, and in some cases extended right across cultivated fields.
Fig. 13.—Map of the United States, showing the large areas over which three of the greatest of our earthquakes were actually felt by people. These earthquakes were recorded in many parts of the world by delicate instruments: New Madrid, 1811; Charleston, 1886; San Francisco, 1906.
