Blog Entry #2

Title: “What Caused the Devastating Haiti Earthquake?”

Summary:

The reason why there is a lot of destruction in response to the earthquake is because the two plates (Caribbean and North American) that run through Haiti moved about 20mm. Unfortunately the impact was so close, the intensity was more powerful than it would be if it was further away from the Earth’s surface. Another justification for why the earthquake was so disastrous is because it lasted approximently 35 seconds to 1 minute. This isn’t good because a lot of Haiti’s buildings, homes and other structures weren’t built nor designed to uphold an earthquake of any strength. According to a logarithmic scale the energy of the earthquake was a 7.0-magnitude (which is extremely strong).

Reflection:

When I found out how dramatic the earthquake was I was flabbergasted, as soon as the news anchor declared the earthquake was a 7.0 magnitude. I already knew extreme damage had been done. (From previous knowledge I know that earthquakes are determined on a scale of 1-10). This doesn’t specifically effect or relate to me, but I know if I had a loved one over there I would be concerned just like anybody else would be. In many ways I feel helpless, I wish I could help personally, but being that the distance is so far it is hard to do so.

Evidence:

“The shaking started on Tuesday, Jan. 12, at 4:53 p.m. ET in the Haiti region, just 10 miles southwest of Port-au-Prince.”

“The threat is not over.So far we have monitored over 40 aftershocks ranging from 4.5 all the way up to 5.9," Bedwell said. About 14 of those aftershocks were magnitude 5.0 or larger. And they expect more in the coming weeks”

“All of these effects get magnified when the infrastructure is shoddy and not built to withstand shaking.”

"Unfortunately, Haiti has a rather poor economy and not a wonderful building style for earthquake resistance, so we would expect that we would see quite severe and widespread damage from this earthquake,"Michael Blanpeid, associate coordinator for the USGS Earthquake Hazards Program, said in a podcast released today.”

Questions:

What does magnitude mean?
Where are these two plates located, and what do they look like?
Can or will it happen again?
Has this happened before?
What were the expenses of damage?
Where was the core of the earthquake?

Work Cited:
I found all of my information and quotes from the following:

“What caused the devastating Haiti earthquake?” MsnBc. 13 Jan. 2010. Live Science. 27 Jan. 2010 <http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/34842469/>.