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North American Earthquake Research Paper

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An earthquake is defined as a sudden and violent shaking of the ground, sometimes causing great destruction, as a result of movements within the earth's crust or volcanic action by the dictionary. Earthquakes happen frequently, but most people only hear about the ones that cause much damage and fatalities in the news. Some earthquakes have a high magnitude with less damage than other earthquakes that have a lower magnitude with more damage and fatalities. There are several explanations to this. The Haitian earthquake on Tuesday January 12, 2010 had a magnitude of 7.0 and a depth of 13km. This earthquake resulted in 316,000 people dead, 300,000 people injured, and 1.3 million people displaced. Tsunami waves were reported in multiple locations including Santo Domingo and the Dominican Republic. The earthquake occurred in the region separating the Caribbean plate and the North American plate. The earthquake was caused by a transform fault which is a strike-slip fault occurring at the boundary between two plates of the earth's crust. After the initial earthquake, fifty-nine aftershocks of 4.5 or greater were felt. Damages and fatalities were high because of the magnitude and the lack of building regulations to withstand earthquakes. Haiti, …show more content…
Five-hundred and twenty-three people were killed, 12,000 injured, and 800,000 were displaced. Tsunami waves were recorded at Concepcion and Dichato. The earthquake was near a subduction zone fault. The Nazca plate and the South American plate are converging.The earthquake was felt 335 km away in Santiago, Chile (Magnitude 8.8). Unlike the earthquake in Haiti, the Chilean earthquake did not cause as many fatalities or as much damage. The magnitude and depth were both higher than the Haitian earthquake, but because Chile has more building regulations and is a more modernized country, the earthquake had less damage and deaths than

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