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Azhar Mahmood

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Defination of seismic waves :
A wave of energy that is generated by an earthq
uake or other earth vibration and that travels w
ithin the earth or along its surface.
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 Around 132 AD, Chinese scientist Chang
Heng invented the first seismoscope, an
instrument that could register the occurrence
of an earthquake.

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Awave can be described
as a disturbance that
travels through
a medium from one
location to another
location.
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• Seismic waves are the waves of energy caused
by the sudden breaking of rock within the earth
or an explosion. They are the energy that travels
through the earth and is recorded on
seismographs.
• There are several different kinds of seismic
waves, and they all move in different ways. The
two main types of waves are body waves and
surface waves.

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1. Body waves
 Primary waves
 Secondary waves
2 . Surface waves
 Love waves
 Rayleigh waves

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 Body waves are those waves which travells
through the interior of the earth.

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P Waves (compression wave)
 The first kind of body wave is the P wave or primary wave.
This is the fastest kind of seismic wave. The P wave can move
through solid rock and fluids, like water or the liquid layers of
the earth. It pushes and pulls the rock it moves through just
like sound waves push and pull the air.

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 P-waves are the fastest waves created by an
earthquake. They travel through the Earth’s
interior and can pass through both solid and
molten rock. They shake the ground back and
forth – like a Slinky – in their travel direction,
but do little damage as they only move
buildings up and down.

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 In air, they take the form of sound waves,
hence they travel at the speed of sound.
Typical speeds are 330 m/s in air, 1450 m/s
in water and about 5000 m/s in granite.

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 Primary waves (P-waves) are compressional
waves that are longitudinal in nature. P waves
are pressure waves that travel faster than
other waves through the earth to arrive at
seismograph stations first hence the name
"Primary". These waves can travel through any
type of material, including fluids, and can
travel at nearly twice the speed of S waves

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 S wave (transverse wave)
 The second type of body wave is the S wave or
secondary wave, which is the second wave you feel
in an earthquake. An S wave is slower than a P
wave and can only move through solid rock. This
wave moves rock up and down, or side-to-side.

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 S-waves lag behind P-waves as they travel
1.7 times slower and can only pass through
solid rock. However they do more damage
because they’re bigger and shake the ground
vertically and horizontally.

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 S-waves are shear waves, which move particles
perpendicularly to their direction of propagation.
They can propagate through solid rocks because
these rocks have enough shear strength. The shear
strength is one of the forces that hold the rock
together, and prevent it from falling into pieces.
Liquids do not have the same shear strength: that
is why, if you take a glass of water and suddenly
remove the glass, the water will not keep its glass
shape and will just flow away. In fact, it is just a
matter of rigidity: S-waves need a medium rigid
enough to propagate. Hence, S-waves do not
propagate through liquids.

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 Surface waves are those waves which travels
through the surface of the earth.

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1. Love waves
 A type of seismic surface wave in which
particles move with a side-to-side motion
perpendicular to the main propagation of the
earthquake. The amplitude of this motion
decreases with depth. Love waves cause the
rocks they pass through to change in shape.
They travel faster than Rayleigh waves.
 the Love waves at about 3.5 km/s

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 A type of seismic surface wave that moves with a
rolling motion that consists of a combination of
particle motion perpendicular and parallel to the
main direction of wave propagation. The
amplitude of this motion decreases with depth.
Like primary waves, Rayleigh waves are
alternatingly compressional and extensional
(they cause changes in the volume of the rocks
they pass through). Rayleigh waves travel slower
than Love waves.
 the Rayleigh waves at 3.0 km/s

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 The Rayleigh waves "roll" along the surface,
described as "up and over backwards roll."

These surface waves do most of the damage

to structures. The Love waves shake us from
side to side and the Rayleigh waves shake us
up and down

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 On the basis of seismic waves we differentiate
different layers of earth
 On the basis of seismic waves we sub
classified the layers.

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 Use in the identification of hydrocarbons
reservoirs.
 Oil and gas exploration.

That’s end.

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