Articles tagged as Earthquakes | Smithsonian Magazine

This updated earthquake hazard map shows seven million more Americans are at risk of quakes

March 29, 2016

A woman sits amid the ruins of the Great Stone Church, which collapsed in an 1812 earthquake, at Mission San Juan Capistrano.

San Andreas May Have Had Help Triggering a Historic Earthquake

New evidence about a devastating quake in 1812 hints that the San Jacinto fault may be a bigger seismic risk than anyone thought

March 11, 2016

One hundred and eleven new buildings were constructed in the downtown area between 1931 and 1933. The vast majority took their cues from Art Deco, the era’s cutting-edge architectural trend.

How an Earthquake Turned This New Zealand Town into the Art Deco Capital of the World

Napier turned its tragic past into an architectural wonder

February 19, 2016

Stanford Scientists Create an Algorithm That Is the “Shazam” For Earthquakes

The popular song-identifying app has inspired a technique for identifying microquakes in the hopes of predicting major ones

December 11, 2015

A person stands in front of a fault in Utah. Better understanding how rocks behave under stress and along faults like this could help geologists more accurately identify places at risk of earthquakes.

Big Quakes Can Trigger Other Shakes Thousands of Miles Away

According to new research, when a big one strikes, more than aftershocks can follow

October 16, 2015

New Research

50-Year-Old Moon Data Reveals Unseen Earthquakes

Scientists have identified four different types of moonquakes in data left over from Apollo 17

September 24, 2015

People walk past the damaged Durbar High School a few days after the major earthquake that struck Nepal in April.

Anthropocene

What Happened When a Disaster Preparedness Expert Was Caught in an Earthquake

In this Generation Anthropocene podcast, geologist Anne Sanquini gives her first-hand account of April’s disaster in Nepal

August 11, 2015

New Research

Why Don’t Balancing Boulders Fall During Earthquakes?

The interaction of nearby fault lines may lessen ground shaking around some balancing rocks

August 10, 2015

Debris still litters Durbar Square in Kathmandu, seen in June 2015.

New Research

Why the Nepal Earthquake Was Especially Bad for Cultural Sites

The major quake sparked a resonance in the basin that made taller buildings more likely to topple

August 6, 2015

Not a movie still: Fire rages on a flooded street following the 1994 Northridge earthquake in California.

What Will Really Happen When San Andreas Unleashes the Big One?

A major earthquake will cause plenty of destruction along the West Coast, but it won’t look like it does in the movies

May 28, 2015

Six years after the quake first struck, the city of L’Aquila is still rebuilding. The recovery is estimated to cost at least $16 billion.

The Shaky Science Behind Predicting Earthquakes

A powerful earthquake in Italy killed hundreds of people—and set in motion a legal battle and scientific debate that has kept seismologists on edge

June 2015

Sentinel-1 image showing the effects of the April 25 earthquake in Nepal

Satellite data gives the first results for the way the land moved during the quake

May 1, 2015

This Interactive Map Shows Nepal Before and After the Earthquake

New satellite map shows devastation of Nepal from space

April 29, 2015

The rubble of Dharahara Tower, which was once the tallest building in Nepal.

Historic sites were damaged and destroyed in the 7.8 quake

April 27, 2015

A man holds his mobile phone as he sits in the ruins of a house in Minamisanriku, Japan, after the area was devastated by a magnitude 9.0 earthquake and tsunami in March 2011.

Getting a Push Notification on Your Cell Phone? It Could Be Warning You About an Earthquake

Sophisticated GPS sensors in the average mobile device could be harnessed for seismic early warning systems around the world

April 10, 2015

Cool Finds

These Bells Play Seismic Shifts

Watch as UC Berkeley’s bells play the earth’s “natural frequencies”

February 10, 2015

An aerial view of the New Zealand coast shows marine terraces lifted up by an earthquake.

Scientists Have Imaged the Base of a Tectonic Plate

The discovery of a slippery layer off the coast of New Zealand could help explain plate movement

February 4, 2015

Cool Finds

Here’s One Very Good Reason to Drill Deep Into an Active Fault

Scienctists hope to install instruments at the fault to observe changes in the earth at depth

October 9, 2014

Rescue workers look through the ruins left by the August 3, 2014 earthquake.

New Research

Deadly Chinese Earthquake May Have Been Man-Made

More than 600 people died in the August 3 Yunnan earthquake

September 10, 2014

Cool Finds

Napa Earthquake Turned Dry Creeks Wet Again

“Miracle water” wets some of California’s dried streams

September 9, 2014