INTRODUCTION

EARTHQUAKE
➢ broad-banded vibratory
ground motions, resulting
from a number of causes
including tectonic ground
motions, volcanism, and
man-made explosions
Of these, naturally occurring
tectonic-related
earthquakes are the largest
and most important. These
are caused by the fracture
and sliding of rock along
faults within Earth’s crust.
A FAULT is a zone of the earth’s crust within which the two sides have
moved. Faults may be hundreds of miles long, from one to over one
hundred miles deep, and are sometimes not readily apparent on the
ground zone.
EARTHQUAKES initiate a number of phenomena or
agents, termed seismic hazards, which can cause
significant damage to the built environment. These
include the following:

1. Fault rupture
2. Vibratory ground motion
3. Inundation
4. Various kinds of permanent ground failure
5. Hazardous material release.
FAULT RUPTURE
VIBRATORY GROUND MOTION (i.e., shaking)
INUNDATION (i.e., tsunami, seiche, dam failure)
INUNDATION (i.e., tsunami, seiche, dam failure)
INUNDATION (i.e., tsunami, seiche, dam failure)
 Liquefaction is a phenomenon
in which the strength and
stiffness of a soil is reduced by
earthquake shaking or other
rapid loading. It occurs in
saturated soils.

VARIOUS KINDS OF PERMANENT GROUND FAILURE (i.e., liquefaction)

 The water exerts a pressure
on the soil particles that
influences how tightly the
particles themselves are
pressed together.

VARIOUS KINDS OF PERMANENT GROUND FAILURE (i.e., liquefaction)

CAUSES OF EARTHQUAKES
In a global sense, tectonic earthquakes result from motion between a number
of large plates comprising the earth’s crust or lithosphere (about 15 large
plates, in total)
15 MAJOR PLATES:

1. African Plate 8. Indian Plate

2. Antarctic Plate 9. Juan de Fuca Plate
3. Arabian Plate 10. Nazca Plate
4. Australian Plate 11. North American Plate
5. Caribbean Plate 12. Pacific Plate
6. Cocos Plate 13. Philippine Plate
7. Eurasian Plate 14. Scotia Plate
15. South American Plate
• These plates are driven by the
convective motion of the material
in the earth’s mantle, which in
turn is driven by the heat
generated at the earth’s core.

• Relative plate motion at the fault

interface is constrained by friction
and/or asperities (areas of
interlocking due to protrusions in
the fault surfaces).
• Strain energy accumulates in the plates,
eventually overcomes any resistance, and
causes slip between the two sides of the
fault

• This sudden slip, termed Elastic Rebound by

Reid (1910) based on his studies of regional
deformation following the 1906 San
Francisco Earthquake, releases large
amounts of energy, which constitutes or is
the earthquake.

• Earthquake occurs with greatest frequency

at the boundaries of the tectonic plates
• The boundary of the Pacific Plate is the source of nearly half of the world’s greatest
earthquakes. Stretching 40,000 km (24,000 miles) around the circumference of the
Pacific Ocean, it includes Japan, the west coast of North America, and other highly
populated areas, and is aptly termed the Ring of Fire.
• The Ring of Fire originated
because the plats that make
up the Pacific basin are
generally subducting beneath
continental plates, causing
subduction-zones volcanism in
the surface.

• Nearly 80% of the earth’s

volcanoes are found near the
tectonic plate boundaries of
the Pacific Ocean.
SUBDUCTION ZONES
AND
OCEANIC TRENCHES
The Mariana Trench is the world’s
deepest point in the ocean with a
depth of 11304 meters.
• Tectonic Plates move relatively slowly (5 cm per year
is relatively fast) and irregularly, with relatively
frequent small and only occasional large earthquakes.

• Forces may build up for decades or centuries at plate

interfaces until a large movement occurs at all once.
• These sudden, violent motions produce the shaking
that is felt as an earthquake.

• The shaking can cause direct damage to buildings,

roads, bridges, and other man-made structures as
well as triggering landslides, fires, tidal waves
(tsunamis), and other damaging phenomena.