Motivations for studying earthquake phenomena

¶ … Earthquakes

As a resident of California, few things have the ability to terrify me as the thought of a major Pacific coast earthquake. Earthquakes are terrifying for a variety of reasons. First, they are sudden and occur without any immediate warning. In addition, they are very violent; when major earthquakes strike densely populated areas, death and destruction is inevitable. Furthermore, while earthquake activity is heavily focused in areas that lie along major fault lines, earthquakes can theoretically impact almost anywhere, and their major damage can occur miles away from their epicenters. There are approximately half-a-million detectable earthquakes each year, about 100,000 of those can be felt by humans, and only about 100 of them cause any type of damage or death.

The element that makes earthquakes so terrifying is the fact that they are relatively unpredictable and sudden. Of course, it is incorrect to state that earthquakes are unpredictable. There are certain areas of major fault activity, most notably Japan, and one can certainly predict that earthquakes will continue to plague the area, bringing large-scale destruction of property and deaths. However, it is not feasible to remove human populations from the most earthquake-prone areas, some of which are incredibly densely populated. Furthermore, the reality of modern life is that there are some activities, such as driving under freeway overpasses, which greatly increase the risk of death during significant seismic activity. However, what if there was a way to increase warning time, and give people sufficient notice of a coming earthquake, so that people could end high-risk activities and get to safer locations? It would not end the death and destruction of earthquakes; the force of the earth is simply too powerful, but it might go far to mitigate such suffering. I am interested in studying earthquakes, because I believe there must be a way to develop such a warning system.