Another earthquake in Indonesia! The recent earthquake is toooo much!
On June 17, an earthquake of magnitude 6.0 occurred in Yibin, China. On July 4, an earthquake occurred in Queensland, Charlotte, Canada, with a magnitude of 6.2. On July 6, a magnitude 7.1 earthquake occurred in California, USA. On July 7, an earthquake of magnitude 6.9 occurred in the Maluku Sea, Indonesia, and even caused a tsunami. For a time, everywhere were rumors: someone said that there will be a huge earthquake in the near future, someone said that the sunspots caused frequent earthquakes in a 11-year cycle. Aside from these rumors, many people still have questions: Why is the earthquake so frequent recently? Is the crust more and more unstable in recent years?
Has the earthquake been more frequent than ever before? What are the factors that cause the earthquake? Where are the earthquakes more frequent in China? Why did Sichuan Province have never heard of any earthquake before 2008, however, feels like it is often shocked after 2008? Where are the earthquake-prone areas of the world?
1. Is the recent earthquake really more frequent than before?
In order to answer these questions, we obtained 131,865 earthquake data of magnitude 4.5 and above that have occurred globally from USGS since 2000. Let’s take a look.
This is the annual number of earthquakes above 4.5 in the world since 2000. It can be seen that since 2000, there have been an average of 6,674 earthquakes of magnitude 4.5 or above per year in the world (in fact, the Earth has always started the “vibration mode”), and by July 9, 2019, 3373 times have occurred. Compared with other years. There is no obvious improvement.
Others said that the earthquake and sunspot activity cycle is 11 years, last time was 2008, this time is 2019.
However, as can be seen from the picture, the number of earthquakes of magnitude 4.5 or above in 2008 was 6,309, 455 fewer than the average. There is no so-called earthquake affected by the periodicity (11 years) of sunspot outbreaks. Of course, some people may say that the periodicity mentioned here refers to huge earthquakes. Let’s take a look at another picture.
This is the graph of the number of earthquakes with magnitude 7 or above in the world in the past 20 years. In the past 19 years, there have been an average of 12.8 huge earthquakes each year. This has happened 7 times this year, compared with other years, there is no significant improvement, and 11 years ago in 2008, happened 9 times, 3.8 times less than the average number. Therefore, the statement that the earthquake is linked to the sunspot activity cycle is, to a certain extent, an attempt to link the 2019 earthquake with the 2008 Wenchuan earthquake, which will cause people’s panic. It is not advisable.
What we can do is to popularize earthquake common sense and learn how to face earthquakes. This is enough.
2、What are the factors that caused the earthquake?
Earthquakes mainly include natural earthquakes and artificial earthquakes. Most of the natural earthquakes are caused by plate collision, underground rock rupture, which belongs to tectonic earthquakes. We obtained 161,565 earthquake data from July 8, 2018 to July 9, 2019, and found that 97.9% of the earthquakes belonged to tectonic earthquakes.
We made a heat map, the data comes from China’s earthquake with level 5 and above last 20 years. The darker the color, the more frequent the earthquake.
As can be seen from the picture, China’s earthquakes are mainly concentrated in Sichuan, Yunnan, Tibet, Qinghai, Gansu, Xinjiang, and east Taiwan. These places are also places where plate activities are frequent. In addition, countries such as Nepal, Myanmar, the Philippines, and Japan in the periphery of China are also very popular for earthquakes.
Why do we think that before 2008, It seemed that there was not any earthquake in Sichuan. However, after 2008, Sichuan’s earthquake was very frequent. We have summarized the following reasons:
-After 2008, the earthquakes in and around Sichuan were indeed more frequent than before;
-Information circulation has become more and more smooth. Now if earthquake happens somewhere, it may be stronger in your mobile. Which means, in the past, when an earthquake occurred somewhere, someone could feel the earthquake far away, but there would be no big discussion;
-Due to the impact of the 2008 Wenchuan earthquake, the earthquake is now getting more and more attention.
Again, we project this data on a map in the form of dots. It can be seen that there is a very obvious northeast-southwest-oriented seismic zone in the north of Ya’an, Chengdu, Deyang, Mianyang and Guangyuan.
5. What are the regions with frequent earthquakes around the world?
We often hear about earthquakes in Indonesia, earthquakes in Japan, etc. What are the countries or regions where earthquakes occur frequently around the world?
We selected the top 10 countries/regions with the highest number of earthquakes of magnitude 4.5 or above in the past 20 years. It can be seen that Indonesia and Japan are the countries with the most earthquakes in the world. In particular, Indonesia has had 15,661 earthquakes of magnitude 4.5 or above since 2000, with an average of 2.2 per day. In addition, there are Philippines, Oceania in Papua New Guinea, Tonga, Vanuatu, New Zealand, Solomon Islands, Chile in South America, and Alaska in North America.
6、Major earthquakes that have attracted worldwide attention since 2000
Earthquakes are natural phenomena and disasters that cannot be intervened and are not yet fully predictable. It tells us to fear nature, understand nature, and learn to master the laws of nature to reduce the impact of disasters. Let’s take a look at the eight major earthquakes that have drawn worldwide attention since 2000.
Finally, I hope that everyone will learn more about earthquake-related knowledge. If the earthquake comes, don’t believe rumors, don’t spread rumors, make relevant countermeasures, and deal with it correctly.
Tip: If you wanna know how to make the heat map by Python, please follow me or my page: https://www.facebook.com/Data-Analysis-Enthusiast-481380435739184/?modal=admin_todo_tour , I will write the steps in my next article~
