ES-394

SEISMIC WAVES & SEISMOLOGY

Abdul Muneeb
04111713063
Earthquake Seismology (practical)
INTRODUCTION
❖ Earthquake Seismology
Seismology is the study of earthquakes and seismic waves that move through and around
the earth. A seismologist is a scientist who studies earthquakes and seismic waves.

❖ Seismic Waves
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.

When an earthquake occurs, the shockwaves of released energy that shake the Earth and
temporarily turn soft deposits, such as clay, into jelly (liquefaction) are called seismic waves, from the
Greek ‘seismos’ meaning ‘earthquake’. Seismic waves are usually generated by movements of the
Earth’s tectonic plates but may also be caused by explosions, volcanoes and landslides.

Seismologists use seismographs to record the amount of time it takes seismic waves to travel
through different layers of the Earth. As the waves travel through different densities and stiffness, the
waves can be refracted and reflected. Because of the different behaviour of waves in different
materials, seismologists can deduce the type of material the waves are travelling through.

The results can provide a snapshot of the Earth’s internal structure and help us to locate and
understand fault planes and the stresses and strains acting on them.

This wave behaviour can also be used on a smaller scale by recording waves generated by explosions
or ground vibrators in the search for oil and gas.

❖ Basic parameters of wave

Physics shows us that energy is always transmitted in waves. Every wave has a high point
called a crest and a low point called a trough. Waves are mechanical and longitudinal waves
(same direction of vibration as the direction of propagation) that result from an oscillation of
pressure that travels through a solid, liquid or gas in a wave pattern. These waves show
numerous characteristics including wavelength, frequency, period and amplitude.
 ❖ Types of Seismic Waves
The two main types of waves are body waves and surface waves. Body waves can travel through the
earth's inner layers, but surface waves can only move along the surface of the planet like ripples on
water. Earthquakes radiate seismic energy as both body and surface waves.

o Body Waves
Traveling through the interior of the earth, body waves arrive before the surface waves emitted
by an earthquake. These waves are of a higher frequency than surface waves.

They are subdivided into two:

▪ P-wave

P-waves, also known as primary waves or pressure waves, travel at the

greatest velocity through the Earth. When they travel through air, they take the
form of sound waves – they travel at the speed of sound (330 ms-1) through air but
may travel at 5000 ms-1 in granite. Because of their speed, they are the first waves to
be recorded by a seismograph during an earthquake.

They differ from S-waves in that they propagate through a material by alternately
compressing and expanding the medium, where particle motion is parallel to the
direction of
wave propagation –
this is rather like a
slinky that is partially
stretched and laid flat
and its coils are
compressed at one
end and then released.

P waves are also

known
as compressional
waves, because of the
pushing and pulling
they do. Subjected to a
P wave, particles move
in the same direction
that the the wave is
moving in, which is the
direction that the
energy is traveling in,
 and is sometimes called the 'direction of wave propagation'

▪ S-wave
S-waves, also known as secondary waves, shear waves or shaking waves, are
transverse waves that travel slower than P-waves. In this case, particle motion
is perpendicular to the direction of wave propagation. Again, imagine a slinky
partially stretched, except this time, lift a section and then release it, a transverse
wave will travel along the length of the slinky. This property of S waves that led
seismologists to conclude that the Earth's outer core is a liquid.

o Surface Waves
Surface waves are similar in nature to water waves and travel just under the Earth’s surface.
They are typically generated when the source of the earthquake is close to the Earth’s surface.
Although surface waves travel more slowly than S-waves, they can be much larger
in amplitude and can be the most destructive type of seismic wave. There are two basic kinds
of surface waves:

▪ Love Waves
The first kind of surface wave is called a Love wave, named after A.E.H. Love, a
British mathematician who worked out the mathematical model for this kind of
 wave in 1911. It's the fastest surface wave and moves the ground from side-to-side.
Confined to the surface of the crust, Love waves produce entirely horizontal motion.

▪ Rayleigh Waves
A Rayleigh wave moves along the
ground simply like a wave moves
over a lake or a sea. Since it moves,
it moves the ground here and there,
and side-to-side a similar way that
the wave is moving. The vast
majority of the shaking felt from a
quake is because of the Rayleigh
wave, which can be a lot bigger than
different waves. They get weaker
with depth. Their frequency
gradually increases.
 Summary of Seismic wave types and properties

Discussion
Now, we will discuss how to apply techniques using instruments to get measurements.

❖ Seismometry
It is the development and design of the seismic recording systems.
 o Seismometer
It is an instrument that senses the ground motion

o Seismograph
It is an instrument which monitors and records ground vibrations.

o Seismogram
It is a record of ground motion produced by seismograph. For

seismometers we have two components which are as follow:

Actually, the ground motions have 3 different direction because of which we
use these two seismometers to understand the waves perfectly. After
recording the waves, the result is somewhat like this. This figure shows how
different waves arrive at different times and this is due to the different
lithologies and substances present in the earth’s interior.

And it’s not just about the lithologies, the earths spherical shape also comes
into play with propagation of such waves.
This is a visual representation of which wave arrives first and which arrive late. Body waves
are the first to arrive and then the surface. The packages that I was discussing were these
four waves. And through this figure you can also see the amplitudes by which we
differentiate these waves.

❖ Travel time
Travel times are best conceptualized of with an analogy of an auto trip. If you have to travel 120 miles
and you drive 60 mph, you'll get to your destination in two hours, if you are forced to drive at a speed
of 30 mph, it will take you twice as long to arrive at your destination. The mathematical formula we
use in this problem is driving time = (distance of trip) / (driving speed) To apply those ideas to
earthquake studies, think of the earthquake location as the starting point for the trip and the
seismometer as the place where the trip concludes. Faster waves will travel the distance quicker and
show up on the seismogram first. travel time = (distance from earthquake to seismometer) / (seismic
wave speed) Travel time is a relative time, it is the number of minutes, seconds, etc. that the wave
took to complete its journey. The arrival time is the time when we record the arrival of a wave - it is
an absolute time, usually referenced to Universal Coordinated Time (a 24-hour time system used in
many sciences). Here's an example to illustrate the difference: if two earthquakes occurred at the
same place but exactly 24 hours apart, the wave travel times would be the same, but the arrival times
would differ by one day.
 ❖ Wave speed
Seismic waves travel fast, on the order of kilometres per second (km/s). The precise speed
that a seismic wave travels depends on several factors, most important is the composition of
the rock. We are fortunate that the speed depends on the rock type because it allows us to
use observations recorded on seismograms to infer the composition or range of compositions
of the planet. But the process isn't always simple, because sometimes different rock types
have the same seismic-wave velocity, and other factors also affect the speed, particularly
temperature and pressure. Temperature tends to lower the speed of seismic waves and
pressure tends to increase the speed. Pressure increases with depth in Earth because the
weight of the rocks above gets larger with increasing depth. Usually, the effect of pressure is
the larger and in regions of uniform composition, the velocity generally increases with depth,
even though the increase of temperature with depth works to lower the wave velocity. When
I describe the different seismic wave types below, I'll quote ranges of speed to indicate the
range of values we observe in common terrestrial rocks. But you should keep in mind that the
specific speed throughout Earth will depend on composition, temperature, and pressure.

❖ Measurements of Earthquake With Help Of Seismic

Waves
o Magnitude measures the energy released at the source of the earthquake. Magnitude is
determined from measurements on seismographs. Intensity measures the strength of
shaking produced by the earthquake at a certain location. Intensity is determined from
effects on people, human structures, and the natural environment.
o Calculating earthquake magnitude
o The magnitude of an earthquake is a number that allows earthquakes to be compared with
each other in terms of their relative power. For several decades, earthquake magnitudes
were calculated based on a method first developed by Charles Richter, a seismologist based
in California. Richter used seismograms of earthquakes that occurred in the San Andreas
fault zone to calibrate his magnitude scale.
o Two measurements are factored together to determine the Richter magnitude of an
earthquake: the amplitude of the largest waves recorded on a seismogram of the
earthquake, and the distance to the epicenter of the earthquake. The maximum amplitude
seismic wave – the height of the tallest one – is measured in mm on a seismogram. The
distance to the epicenter must also be taken into account because the greater the distance
from the earthquake, the smaller the waves get. The effect of distance is factored out of the
calculation. There is no upper limit defined for the Richter scale, but after a century of
seismograph measurements, it appears that rocks in the earth release their stress before
building up enough energy to reach magnitude 10.
o The Richter scale was found to not transfer very well from the San Andreas fault zone, a
transform plate boundary, to the much more powerful earthquakes that occur at convergent
plate boundaries, particularly subduction zone earthquakes. Therefore, the Richter scale has
been replaced by the moment magnitude scale, symbolized as Mw.
o The moment magnitude scale is broadly similar to the Richter scale, but it takes more factors
into account, including the total area of the fault that moves during the earthquake, and
how much it moves. This produces a magnitude number that is a better indicator of the total
 amount of energy released by the earthquake. Because the moment magnitude scale has
replaced the Richter scale, we will assume from here on that we are referring to moment
magnitude, not Richter magnitude, when we speak of earthquake magnitude.
o The magnitude scale portrays energy logarithmically to approximately base 32. For example,
a magnitude 6.0 earthquake releases about 32 times as much energy as a magnitude 5.0
earthquake. A magnitude 7.0 releases about 32 × 32 = 1024 times as much energy as a
magnitude 5.0 earthquake. A magnitude 9.0 earthquake, which rarely occurs, releases over a
million times as much energy as a magnitude 5.0 earthquake.

Conclusion
Physical processes associated to the occurrence of strong motions may be grouped into three basic
categories: source, site and path effects. The first two account for phenomena that occur locally at
the source or the observation site, while the third is related to the wave propagation between these
two regions. Extensive research on seismic source and site response has been done. From an
engineering point of view it’s important to understand how the seismic energy is propagated from a
hypocenter to a certain site. The effects of site conditions on seismic motions are usually interpreted
to mean how seismic waves from the lithosphere are affected by the geometrical and geological
structure of the softer sedimentary deposit during wave transmission to the surface. The present
paper intends to be a signal for an interdisciplinary approach for improving knowledge for
understanding the causes of distant earthquake damage and amplification at regional distances.

1. The complexity of earthquake ground motion is due to three factors: source, path and local
site effects.
2. Next to a given location, along the propagation path of a seismic wave, a cycle of
deformation arrives with a certain value of its period “TSW”; the motion with this period
value is transmitted to the sedimentary geological deposit which will further generate the
maximum dynamic effects to some of the civil engineering works above it.
3. The value of the period of the cycle of deformation in the lithosphere, TSW, next to a given
location, depends on the distance “hypocenter – location”, on the severity of the
earthquake (the seismic magnitude), on the nature of rocks in lithosphere, and more likely
on other unknown factors.
4. The seismic waves arrived through the lithosphere next to a location are transmitted to the
surface of the Earth almost vertically.
References
https://www.sciencelearn.org.nz/resources/340-seismic-waves

http://www.geo.mtu.edu/UPSeis/waves.html

https://www.bgs.ac.uk/discoveringGeology/hazards/earthquakes/seismicWaves.html

https://www.ucl.ac.uk/EarthSci/people/lidunka/GEOL2014/Geophysics4%20-
%20Seismic%20waves/SEISMOLOGY%20.htm