Seismographs are like alarm clockes

Earthquakes are natural disaster that can occur any time; we are not able to predict them yet. It’s one of the most incontrollable disaster; so it surely needs a measuring device, in order to be able to appreciate the size of it.

The size of an earthquake depends on the size of the fault and the amount of slip on the fault, but this appreciation can’t be made so simple, there is a need of a special device. And the name of this device is the seismograph.

When I was in college, I had a hand-and-home-made seismograph; I presented it at a Physics class. I followed the construction of the real device and using a rotating drum, pen, weight and spring, I succeeded to make a mini-seismograph. It was very helpful, since I understood how it really works a seismograph. So we had it all: the seismograph, the earthquake was improvised by moving the support of the seismograph.

Back to the real world, the functioning of a seismograph is quite simple. Along the spring, there is attached a weight, at the bottom of whom we have the pencil. This pencil is in contact with the rotating drum, so wiggly lines are telling us if there is earthquake or not. A short wiggly line that doesn’t wiggly very much mean a small earthquake, a long one means a large earthquake.  The length of the wiggle depends on the size of the fault and the size of the wiggle depends on the amount of slip.

Scientifically, the size of an earthquake is called the magnitude. Therefore, seismographs are measuring the magnitude of earthquakes. In a common sense, the seismographs are the alarm clocks of the earthquakes.

Hope you enjoyed my hub! Have a nice day!