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[EarthNSky <erthnsky AT bellsouth.net>]

Gene GeRue wrote:

> Now, how many people do you think will make home location choices  
> based on information like this?


About the same number of people who understand the logrhythmic scale and 
base 10.   Seriously.  The difference between the numbers on the scale 
represent a tenfold increase per number AND releases about 31 times more 
energy than the previous number in magnitude....ten times larger on the 
scale, 30 times more energy to release(probably would be a longer 
quake).  That's hard for people to comprehend how a 7 or 8 mag quake 
could be much worse than the 5 they had last year or the 6 they had 20 
years ago.
For you homeschoolers, here's a couple of great pages on Richter:
http://www.gi.alaska.edu/ScienceForum/ASF7/701.html
and http://www.seismo.unr.edu/ftp/pub/louie/class/100/magnitude.html

Also realize that the original Richter scale was only really accurate to 
about 6.8 in mag, but today's modified Richter, moment magnitude scales 
have no upper boundary and could theoretically measure greater than 10 
in mag (think asteroid impact or multiple warhead nukes)

So Gene, you were what, 35 miles from the epicenter of the Northridge 
quake and it almost threw you out of bed at a mag 6.7...can you imagine 
a 7.7, something 10 times stronger and has 30 times more energy?  What 
about an 8.5 or 8.7?  It is hard to think about, and hence people don't 
and retreat to that place called "it won't happen to me".  But you know 
this.


Bev

--
BevanRon of EarthNSky Farm   NW Georgia USDA Zone 7
34.498N 85.076W    Bev is Earth, Ron is Sky