Quakes and Earthquakes

It is 8 o’clock and Sarah is just arriving to her job. She is an important Lawyer and works in a Lawyer’s Buffet building in the beautiful Haitian Island. It is a common day for all employers who work in this building. Sarah takes up the elevator since her office is at 9th floor.

Once there, she greets everybody meanwhile walks toward her office. Have passed only a few minutes when she is sitting in front of her desk typing on her laptop some business cases. Suddenly Sarah feels some disturbed and dizzy. She turns her head everywhere and watches how everything is moving powerfully. Some papers and pictures fall down to floor so fast and the same time she feels the building wobbles from side to side.

By the time, Sarah realizes that she is in the middle of a quake, a great quake. As quick as she can jumps up from her seat and runs right to the door of the office frame, and stays there just a little moment very quiet, trembling and completely silence, while her colleagues run away everywhere, yell aloud and cry very frightened. Sarah’s heart beats so shocked; even so, she keeps in calm down. Once everything has finished, everybody is so confused and asking themselves: What happened? What was that?

Now well, What about you? Do you know the answer? Do you know what a quake is? Have you ever experienced something like this any time?

Since earth has existed, these things have been passing along time. Our planet is moving every instant and of course; the land surface too. Most of the time those lands movements can be hardly imperceptibles but other, can be so strong able to destroy everything killing even animals and people just in a few seconds.

Those natural phenomena called quakes are horizontal or vertical vibrate movements of the earth surface, because of breaking or displacement of the rocks which make up the earth crust.

These breaking of rocks are produced in the geological faults, and they can be wide along of a region, passing through mountains and valleys, woods or rivers, even under the oceans platform.

These breakings or displacements occur when geological faults collide and hitting each other because of great energy released from inner of the earth crust with an amazing destroyed power. It makes that the earth surface continents changes constantly.

Depending of the land movement intensity, we have that a quake is divided into two kinds: quakes and earthquakes...

How can we recognize them? What is the difference between them?

Well... A Quake: it is a land movement of low intensity, which does not cause any material or fiscal damages.

But... An Earthquake: it is a kind of land movement very intense and really dangerous due to cause big material damages, killing even human beings by its strength.

When a quake or an earthquake takes place in a specific point of the planet, it is detected and measured by a "Seismograph" almost immediately. A Seismograph, is an appliance which makes a graphic register of each seismic activity, studying and analyzing the intensity, the time, the long, the location and which one of the earth crust it was produced, (we are referring to the "Hypocenter"; the place where rocks breaks). And also where was the surface manifestation of this land movement, (we are referring to the "Epicenter"; the place where the waves starts).

The damages that make each seismic activity are determined comparing the graphic registers from a pre-established scale with other previous land movements. Within the most used scales, we found three kinds: Richter Scale, Omori Scale, and Mercalli Scale, but the first one; is the best known and the most used over the world.