Seismologists hopes on predicting earthquake in the near future

May 02, 2015 15:32
Seismologists hopes on predicting earthquake in the near future

Cyclones provide meteorologists an opportunity to hone their skills, as do earthquakes for the seismologist. Nepal earthquake will provide an opportunity to advance our understanding of earthquake science more. The state of science is such that we already know a great deal about the earthquake: its magnitude, its depth, its slip rate, its direction, etc. Over the next year, after relief operations are over, seismologists will study the region more intensely, hoping to find one significant thing: when the next big one will occur and where. 

All over the Himalayas, organisations have installed instruments of all kinds, to measure even the weakest signals from Earth that could be remotely related to earthquakes. In Tehri, the Wadia Institute of Himalayan Geology has installed instruments to measure signals from Earth, with the hope of picking up precursors that could provide an alert even in tens of seconds before a large one occurs somewhere else. This exercise is about ten years old.

"We have not found even precursors so far," says Anil Gupta, director of the institute. The world over, seismologists have looked at many signals to provide an early warning system for earthquakes, but not successful till date.

Current warning systems, in place in Japan, do provide valuable information as the Earth starts shaking. They act when the first set of short wavelengths of the earthquake set in and warn people to take action before the more destructive longer wavelengths hit their buildings. This system helped to save many lives in the 2011 Japan earthquake. Seismologists are interested in finding warning signs that could alert people before an earthquake starts. "Every earthquake has its own precursors," says D Srinagesh, chief scientist at the National Geophysical Research Institute (NGRI) in Hyderabad, "like every person has a unique retina pattern." This means that such precursors, if found, could be evident only after an earthquake.

Once an earthquake occurs, it is possible to know very quickly the epicentre, the magnitude and the depth. Seismologists also know the extent of the fault rupture, its direction and can locate aftershocks.

"Earthquake science is more fashionable than earthquake engineering," says Sudhir Jain, director of the Indian Institute of Technology in Gandhinagar, and one of the country's foremost experts in earthquake engineering.

By Premji

 

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