Review material for Exam #1 in GLG 112 Natural Disasters – Spring 2010
Exam 1 covers Chapter 1 Introduction to Natural Disasters, Chapter 2
Earthquakes, and Chapter 3 Tsunamis
Be sure to read the material in each chapter along with your lecture notes;
reread the chapter summaries and look at the list of terms. Carefully review
each slide in the respective presentations online at
http://oak.ucc.nau.edu/dmb25
For each chapter below have an understanding of the following material—
Chapter 1:
Evolution of scientific ideas through the path of hypothesis-theory-law [or
principle]; know an example of each; Know what contributes to high loss of life, esp. in
underdeveloped countries such as those in Asia; what post-event effects result from
major events? What are natural hazards and what are examples? Know the descriptor
terms that help explain hazard events and the difference between hazard, disaster, and
catastrophe. Know examples of potential disasters and have an idea of what sections
of the U. S. are prone to the various disasters. What are the most deadly hazards in the
U.S.? Understand the concept of subduction and plate tectonics [this is amplified in
Chapters 2 and 3].
Chapter 2:
Basic information about the Haiti Earthquake of Jan 12, 2010 (from web site
link). What is an earthquake? How do rocks behave when stressed and the result
[strain or deformation]; the concept of stress and strain, and which produces which;
three stages of strain; know the results of extensional and compressional stress
conditions on rocks; formation of the different types of faults and how to determine
the hanging wall and footwall blocks; what are strike-slip faults and where do they
occur; difference between epicenter and focus; types of seismic waves and their basic
characteristics; locating earthquake epicenters; relation between amount of ground
motion and amount of energy expended by an EQ; magnitude and intensity scales and
what each measures; have an idea of how seismometers measure surface movement;
the role of subduction in both EQs and volcanoes; what S-P travel time tells us; the San
Andreas fault and the S. A. fault system, how it formed and its sense of motion;
seismic gaps and what they tell us; what is pancaking; the response of different types
of bedrock and where it is best and worst to construct buildings; the response of
different surface rock types in the San Francisco Bay area to seismic energy [where to
build and not build]; which areas in the U. S. are most likely to experience EQs and
what caused them to be that way; how humans cause EQs; EQ prediction methods.
Chapter 3:
What is a tsunami and what are its characteristics? The causes of tsunami.
Distant vs. local tsunamis. Drawdown vs. runup. Where did the Dec 2004 tsunami
originate and what produced it; what plates were involved and what was their
relationship to each other. Location of EQs in subduction zones; how sea floor
topography influences wave impact on shorelines.