Horizon - Season 40 Episode 8
Earthquakes are among the most devastating natural disasters on the planet. In the last hundred years they have claimed the lives of over one million people. Earthquakes are destructive mainly because of their unpredictable nature. It is impossible to say accurately when a quake will strike but a new theory could help save lives by preparing cities long in advance for an earthquake. The surface of the Earth is made up of large 'tectonic' plates. These plates are in slow but constant motion. When two plates push against each other friction generates a great deal of energy. For this reason earthquakes occur most frequently on tectonic fault lines, where two plates meet. However these fault lines run for thousands of kilometres; predicting exactly where a quake will occur is nearly impossible. In 1992, Dr Ross Stein was monitoring a large earthquake in a town in California called Landers. Three hours later, there was another quake 67km away at Great Bear. Stein believed that this was not simply an aftershock, instead he theorised the event at Landers had set off the earthquake at Big Bear. Stein believes that when an earthquake occurs the stress that has built up along the fault, is in part, transferred along the fault line. It is this energy transfer that causes other quakes to occur hours, days or months after the original.
First Air Date : 1964-02-04
Last Air date : 2024-07-22
Runtime : 57 minutes
Genre : Documentary
Cast :
Crew :
Quality :
Subtitles :
- Season 40 : Episode 12003-01-09
- Season 40 : Episode 22003-01-16
- Season 40 : Episode 32003-01-23
- Season 40 : Episode 42003-01-30
- Season 40 : Episode 52003-02-13
- Season 40 : Episode 62003-02-20
- Season 40 : Episode 72003-02-27
- Season 40 : Episode 82003-03-06
- Season 40 : Episode 92003-03-27
- Season 40 : Episode 102003-04-03
- Season 40 : Episode 112003-04-17
- Season 40 : Episode 122003-05-08
- Season 40 : Episode 132003-05-29
- Season 40 : Episode 142003-11-13
- Season 40 : Episode 152003-11-20
- Season 40 : Episode 162003-11-27
- Season 40 : Episode 172003-12-04
- Season 40 : Episode 182003-12-11
- Season 40 : Episode 192003-12-18