Dr A Rajagopal Kamath
Freelance researcher in Astronomy and Cosmology.
Popular Science author in Malayalam
For the last two decades I am closely monitoring the occurrence of Earthquakes and its connection with the position of astronomical bodies like Sun and moon.
The following interpretations were arrived at, based on the study.
The occurrence of earthquakes in the earthquake vulnerable areas is more during the full moon days. Mainly, areas in the Indian subcontinent, Indonesia, Andaman etc are most vulnerable for earthquake.The closeness of the moon during the lunar perigee phase ( perigee-closest to the earth ) trigger earthquakes near subduction zones. Subduction zones are areas where the tectonic plates slip under another plate thus creating a displacement. Java trench, where the boundary between Indo Australian plate and Eurasian plate is vulnerable for earthquakes. This resulted in the Sumatra earthquake.
The recent Japan earthquake occurred where the Pacific pate slips below north American plate.
Sun affects the earth in many ways. When there is full moon or lunar perigee, if a Solar flare occurs there is strong chance for an earthquake in earthquake vulnerable areas where strain is accumulated in the subduction zones where the tectonic plate boundary lies.
As I said earlier Solar flares trigger earthquakes. . A solar flare is a large explosion in the Sun's atmosphere. Solar flares affect all layers of the solar atmosphere (photosphere, chromosphere, and corona), heating plasma to tens of millions of kelvins and accelerating electrons, protons, and heavier ions to near the speed of light. Sun is getting violent duc to the condition called the approach of Solar maxima which is from 2011-2013.
Please note that the 2004 Dec 26 earthquake was preceded by a prominent solar flare
Similarly the Japan earthquake of March 11 2011 was preceded by a solar flare.( report on solar flare attached. Link is given below.
The position of moon affects the formation of tides. The earth’s interior is in liquid form. That liquid is also vulnerable to the moon’s pull. This pull results in the displacement of tectonic plates, resulting in earthquakes. So if there is a full moon or new moon approaching and if a solar flare occurs then there is chance for an earthquake.
Points
Dec 26 2004 was full moon day. Sumatra earthquake( magnitude 9.3) occurred on that day.
Sept 30 1993 the day before full moon day. Deadly earthquake in Latur( magnitude 6.2)
Oct 23 1991 two days before full moon. Deadly Uttar Kasi earthquake ( magnitude 6.6)
March 27 1964 Alaska earthquake ( magnitude 9.2) occurred before the full moon day.
Nov 21 1833 Sumatra earthquake( Magnitude 9.2) two days later was the full moon day.
Feb 27 2010 Chile earthquake(( Magnitude 8.8) next day was full moon day.
On Jan 19 2011 Pakistan earthquake occurred. It was fullmoon.
Feb 22 2011 Newzealand. Feb 18th was full moon
Now full moon is approaching and it is the time for the SUPER MOON. That is moon is closes to the earth on 19th . It will be less than around 358000 Kms from the earth.
This approach of the moon is the reason behind the occurance of March 11 Honshu earthquake and the fore shocks and after shocks.
There is a chance for a major earthquake especially in the plate boundaries in the Pacific and near Java trench ( Indonesia)during this period. Indian subcontinent is also vulnerable.
LINK
News item on my find.
http://www.hindu.com/2003/11/23/stories/2003112304970400.htm
US Geological survey details regarding my study .
solar flare news.
http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2011/03/10/major-solar-flare-erupts-make-auroras-visible-northern/?test=faces
 Date:19/03/2011 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2011/03/19/stories/2011031950350200.htm Back Kerala - Kozhikode ‘Super Moon could impact earth' Staff Reporter Kozhikode: The ‘Super Moon' effect, in which the moon comes closest to earth, will have an adverse impact on the latter, according to the latest study reports in astronomy and cosmology. A. Rajagopal Kamath, a researcher in the field, says there is a chance for a major tremor especially in the plate boundaries in the Pacific and near the Java trench (Indonesia) coinciding with the ‘Super Moon' on March 19. A Kozhikode-based freelance researcher in astronomy and cosmology, Mr. Kamath says the Indian subcontinent is also vulnerable to the impact of ‘Super Moon.' According to him, the chance for earthquakes is more during the full moon days. Areas in the Indian subcontinent, Indonesia and Andaman are susceptible to mild tremors. The proximity of the moon to earth during the lunar perigee triggers earthquakes near subduction zones where the tectonic plates slide under another plate, creating displacement. The reason for the recent Japan earthquake can also be traced to such a slip in the North American plate. “Sun affects earth in many ways. When there is full moon or lunar perigee and a subsequent solar flare, there is strong chance for an earthquake in vulnerable areas,” Mr. Kamath says. Solar flare is a large explosion in the sun's atmosphere triggering earthquakes. It affects all layers of the solar atmosphere, heating plasma to tens of millions of kelvins and accelerating electrons, protons and heavier ions to near the speed of light. He points out that that the Sumatra earthquake reported in December 26, 2004, was preceded by a prominent solar flare. It was a solar flare that triggered the latest quake in Japan, according to initial reports. Similarly, the position of the moon also affects the formation of tides. As earth's interior is in liquid form, it is vulnerable to the moon's pull resulting in the displacement of tectonic plates triggering earthquakes. Mr. Kamath claims if there is a full moon or new moon with a subsequent solar flare, the chance for a quake will be high. According to Mr. Kamath, six major earthquakes reported from various parts of the world have proved the link between full moon and quakes. Major tremors in Sumatra (Dec. 26, 2004), Latur (Sept. 30, 1993), Uttar Kasi (Oct. 23, 1991) Alaska (March 27, 1964), Sumatra (Nov. 21, 1833), Chile (Feb. 27, 2010) and Pakistan (Jan. 19, 2011) were reported either on the day of a full moon or just two or three days before or after the full moon. A similar, but mild case in Kerala was that of the 2003 tremor experienced in Kannur district. The tremor occurred on a full moon day. Mr. Kamath also points to the quake of 4.7 magnitude on December 12, 2000, in the Idukki-Kottayam area which occurred during a full moon. © Copyright 2000 - 2009 The Hindu |
THE HINDU
Sunday, Nov 23, 2003
GIVEN BELOW a cut and paste version of the detaila.
Of tremors and solar flares By M. Harish Govind
THIRUVANANTHAPURAM NOV. 22. A freelance researcher has suggested that there could be a correlation between seismic tremors and heightened solar activity coinciding with a full moon or new moon.
Rajagopal Kamath, an LIC official based at Kollam, has gone on to "predict'' a moderate earthquake in the Kerala region during the next two months during full moon or new moon as a severe geomagnetic storm is in progress.
Mr. Kamath says he has been observing the changes in the sun's activity and its impact on seismic activity in the South Indian region for the last four years. He has found what he calls a surprising "link'' between solar activity and earthquakes.
The most recent case was that of the November 8 tremor experienced in Kannur. The tremor, which measured 3.2 on the Richter scale, occurred on a full moon day in the wake of a severe geomagnetic storm that began on October 30.
Mr. Kamath also points to the quake of 4.7 magnitude on December 12, 2000, in the Idukki-Kottayam area and the devastating quake of January 26, 2001, in Gujarat. These quakes also occurred during a full moon and a new moon timed with the solar maxima or intense solar activity as part of a 11-year cycle.
``A solar flare has not always been followed by a quake, but a quake was always preceded by a flare, that too during the solar maxima. The sun is now very active and a quake cannot be ruled out,'' says Mr. Kamath.
The solar flares result in coronal mass ejections that send large amounts of charged particles towards the earth.
These particles interrupt satellite communications and cause severe geomagnetic storms.
The solar flare of August 25, 2001, coincided with a quake in Thrissur district on that day. The flare on September 24, 2001, preceded the Gujarat quake by about 72 hours.
Mr. Kamath says that though quantitative proof is lacking to support his theory, seismologists can conduct a study regarding a possible correlation.
``All that I can say is that there is a chance for a tremor in an area where seismic pressure is on the rise when a solar flare is on and the full moon is approaching,'' he says.
Seismologists, however, point out that more data is needed on solar flares and tremors at a global level to prove or disprove such a correlation.
Says Kushala Rajendran of the Centre for Earth Science Studies here, "one should be able to relate it to not only micro-tremors, but also large earthquakes recorded all over the world.''
Mr. Kamath was in the news last year when he questioned the Archaeology Department's claim regarding the antiquity of a sailing vessel, which was discovered at Thaikkal near Cherthala.
He had pointed out certain technical flaws in the dating and subsequent studies had proved that the ship was not as old as was claimed.
US geological survey.
Q: Can the position of the moon or the planets affect seismicity?
A: The moon, sun, and other planets have an influence on the earth in the form of perturbations (small changes) to the gravitational field. The relative amount of influence is proportional to the objects mass, and inversely proportional to the third power of its distance from the earth.
The stresses induced in the earth by an extraterrestrial mass are proportional to the gravitational field gradient dg( r ) / dr
and NOT to the gravitational field g( r ).
g( r ) = GMm / r^2
thus:
dg( r ) / dr = -2 * g( r ) / r = -2GMm / r^3
Many studies in the past have shown no significant correlations between the rate of earthquake occurrence and the semi-diurnal tides when using large earthquake catalogs.
Several recent studies, however, have found a correlation between earth tides (caused by the position of the moon relative to the earth) and some types of earthquakes.
One study, for example, concludes that during times of higher earth and ocean tides, such as during times of full or new moon, earthquakes are more likely on shallow thrust faults near the edges of continents and in (underwater) subduction zones. Lunar or solar eclipses represent, of course, special cases of full and new moon, but do not cause any special or different tidal effects from full and new moon. Earth tides (Earth's surface going up and down by a couple of centimeters) and especially ocean tides (surface of the ocean going up and down by a meter or more) raise and lower the confining pressure on shallow, dipping faults near continental edges and in subduction zones. When the confining pressure is lessened, the faults are unclamped and more likely to slip. The increased probability is a factor of ~3 during high tides. But you must stop are realize that the background probability is, in general, very low in a given place and year (fractions of a percent), so that raising this tiny probability by a factor of 3 during high tides still results in a very tiny probability.
There have also been some small but significant correlations reported between the semi-diurnal tides and the rate of occurrence of aftershocks in some volcanic regions, such as Mammoth Lakes. (UC Berkeley)
The stresses induced in the earth by an extraterrestrial mass are proportional to the gravitational field gradient dg( r ) / dr
and NOT to the gravitational field g( r ).
g( r ) = GMm / r^2
thus:
dg( r ) / dr = -2 * g( r ) / r = -2GMm / r^3
Many studies in the past have shown no significant correlations between the rate of earthquake occurrence and the semi-diurnal tides when using large earthquake catalogs.
Several recent studies, however, have found a correlation between earth tides (caused by the position of the moon relative to the earth) and some types of earthquakes.
One study, for example, concludes that during times of higher earth and ocean tides, such as during times of full or new moon, earthquakes are more likely on shallow thrust faults near the edges of continents and in (underwater) subduction zones. Lunar or solar eclipses represent, of course, special cases of full and new moon, but do not cause any special or different tidal effects from full and new moon. Earth tides (Earth's surface going up and down by a couple of centimeters) and especially ocean tides (surface of the ocean going up and down by a meter or more) raise and lower the confining pressure on shallow, dipping faults near continental edges and in subduction zones. When the confining pressure is lessened, the faults are unclamped and more likely to slip. The increased probability is a factor of ~3 during high tides. But you must stop are realize that the background probability is, in general, very low in a given place and year (fractions of a percent), so that raising this tiny probability by a factor of 3 during high tides still results in a very tiny probability.
There have also been some small but significant correlations reported between the semi-diurnal tides and the rate of occurrence of aftershocks in some volcanic regions, such as Mammoth Lakes. (UC Berkeley)
Major Solar Flare Erupts, May Make Auroras Visible in Northern U.S
The sun unleashed another major solar flare Wednesday, a solar storm so powerful it could spawn dazzling northern lights displays that could be visible from even New York City.The solar flare erupted at 6:23 p.m. EST (2323 GMT), letting loose a wave of charged particles that is aimed straight at Earth and should arrive in the next few days.
When it does, it could supercharge the Earth's aurora borealis -- also known as the Northern Lights -- when the particles interact with the planet's magnetic field and atmosphere. [Photos: Dazzling Auroras Seen by Northern Observers]
"This flare could make the Northern Lights visible as far south as Washington State, central Idaho, northern Wyoming, the Dakotas and east to Chicago, Detroit, NYC and Boston," explains SPACE.com's skywatching columnist Joe Rao. "Of course, we have to hope that the subatomic particles emitted by the flare arrive at the Earth's vicinity during the nighttime hours and of course, that skies are clear!"
Predicting the effects and arrival time of solar storms is very difficult, however, so while the light storm could reach Earth Thursday evening it's not certain it would be visible so far south. Also, bright city lights could render the sky show difficult or impossible to see
Powerful sun storm
The mega sun storm registered as a Class X1.5 event -- one of the most powerful types of flares -- and erupted from a region on the sun near a sunspot called 1166.
It is the second solar flare of this magnitude to occur in the last month. A Class X2.2 storm erupted from the sun on Feb. 14 and was the most powerful solar flare in more than four years.
Space weather trackers classify solar flares in three classes: C, M and X. The weakest types of solar flares are Class C storms, with Class M tempests registering as medium strength, but still powerful, according to a NASA description. The Class X storm is the most powerful type of flare. [Amazing Sun Photos from Space]
In addition to radiation, solar flares can kick up massive eruptions of charged particles and magnetic plasma in what scientists call a coronal mass ejection.
According to Spaceweather.com, a website that monitors space weather and skywatching events, Wednesday's flare may only be the beginning. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is predicting similar events for upcoming days.
"After four years without any X-flares, the sun has produced two of the powerful blasts in less than one month: Feb. 15th and March 9th,"Spaceweather.com wrote. "NOAA forecasters estimate a 5 percent chance of more X-flares during the next 24 hours."
When aimed in Earth's direction, strong solar flares can potentially disrupt satellites and power grids, as well as pose a hazard to astronauts on spacecraft. They can also spark dazzling shows of the northern lights, or aurora borealis.
"An X1/2B flare certainly has the potential of producing bright auroras across southern Canada and the northern United States," Rao said.
NOAA space weather officials measure aurora activity using a scale called a planetary K-index, which rates activity levels from zero to nine. Aurora activity from this latest solar flare could reach a K-7 on that scale, Rao explained.
That suggests northern lights activity could be visible across much of Canada and the uppermost states in the United States, according to a NOAA graphic.
A more active sun
The sun has been extremely active over the last month.
In addition to the major X2.2 class flare on Feb. 14, a powerful storm on Feb. 24 unleashed what NASA scientists called a "monster prominence" – a huge tendril of magnetic plasma – from the surface of the sun.
Between Feb. 24 and Feb. 28, NASA's twin Stereo satellites observed an intense coronal mass ejection erupted from the sun's far side, flinging an enormous tongue of plasma out into space. That storm, however, occurred on the opposite side of the sun from Earth, so it posed no threat to satellites, spacecraft, communications and power grids or other terrestrial infrastructure.
Another major storm erupted on March 7 from the region near a sunspot called 1164. That solar eruption kicked up material at a super-fast rate. The plasma wave was measured at a speed of about 1,367 miles per second (2,200 kps) – about 4.9 million mph – making it the fastest coronal mass ejection seen since 2005, according to Spaceweather.com.
NOAA officials said the charged particles from that sun storm event should be reached Earth by today (March 10).
The sun is currently in the midst of an active phase of its 11-year solar weather cycle. The current sun weather cycle is known as Solar Cycle 24.
Sun and Moon Trigger Deep Tremors on San Andreas Fault
ScienceDaily (Dec. 25, 2009) — The faint tug of the sun and moon on the San Andreas Fault stimulates tremors deep underground, suggesting that the rock 15 miles below is lubricated with highly pressurized water that allows the rock to slip with little effort, according to a new study by University of California, Berkeley, seismologists.
See Also:
In a paper appearing in the Dec. 24 issue of the journal Nature, UC Berkeley graduate student Amanda M. Thomas, seismologist Robert Nadeau of the Berkeley Seismological Laboratory and Bürgmann argue that this extreme sensitivity to stress -- and specifically to shearing stress along the fault -- means that the water deep underground is under extreme pressure.
"The big finding is that there is very high fluid pressure down there, that is, lithostatic pressure, which means pressure equivalent to the load of all rock above it, 15 to 30 kilometers (10 to 20 miles) of rock," Nadeau said. "Water under very high pressure essentially lubricates the rock, making the fault very weak."
Though tides raised in the Earth by the sun and moon are not known to trigger earthquakes directly, they can trigger swarms of deep tremors, which could increase the likelihood of quakes on the fault above the tremor zone, the researchers say. At other fault zones, such as at Cascadia, swarms of tremors in the ductile zone deep underground correlate with slip at depth as well as increased stress on the shallower "seismogenic zone," where earthquakes are generated. The situation on the San Andreas Fault is not so clear, however.
"These tremors represent slip along the fault 25 kilometers (15 miles) underground, and this slip should push the fault zone above in a similar pattern," Bürgmann said. "But it seems like it must be very subtle, because we actually don't see a tidal signal in regular earthquakes. Even though the earthquake zone also sees the tidal stress and also feels the added periodic behavior of the tremor below, they don't seem to be very bothered."
Nevertheless, said Nadeau, "It is certainly in the realm of reasonable conjecture that tremors are stressing the fault zone above it. The deep San Andreas Fault is moving faster when tremors are more active, presumably stressing the seismogenic zone, loading the fault a little bit faster. And that may have a relationship to stimulating earthquake activity."
Seismologists were surprised when tremors were first discovered more than seven years ago, since the rock at that depth -- for the San Andreas Fault, between 15 and 30 kilometers (10 to 20 miles) underground -- is not brittle and subject to fracture, but deformable, like peanut butter. They called them non-volcanic tremors to distinguish them from tremors caused by fluid -- water or magma -- fracturing and flowing through rock under volcanoes. It was not clear, however, what caused the non-volcanic tremors, which are on the order of a magnitude 1 earthquake.
To learn more about the source of these tremors, UC Berkeley seismologists began looking for tremors five years ago in seismic recordings from the Parkfield segment of the San Andreas Fault obtained from sensitive bore-hole seismometers placed underground as part of the UC Berkeley's High-Resolution Seismic Network. Using eight years of tremor data, Thomas, Bürgmann and Nadeau correlated tremor activity with the effects of the sun and moon on the crust and with the effects of ocean tides, which are driven by the moon.
They found the strongest effect when the pull on the Earth from the sun and moon sheared the fault in the direction it normally breaks. Because the San Andreas Fault is a right-lateral strike-slip fault, the west side of the fault tends to break north-northwestward, dragging Los Angeles closer to San Francisco.
"When shear stress on a plane parallel to the San Andreas Fault most encourages slipping in its normal slip direction is when we see the maximum tremor rate," Bürgmann said. "The stress is many, many orders of magnitude less than the pressure down there, which was really, really surprising. You essentially could push it with your hand and it would move."
In fact, the shear stress from the sun, moon and ocean tides amount to around 100 Pascals, or one-thousandth atmospheric pressure, whereas the pressure 25 kilometers underground is on the order of 600 megaPascals, or 6 million times greater.
Nadeau and colleagues reported earlier this year that earthquakes in 2003 and 2004 near the Parkfield segment of the San Andreas Fault increased both tremor activity and stress on the fault itself.
In addition, Nadeau noted, other scientists have shown small tidal effects on tremors in the Cascadia subduction zone, with increased amplitude during certain periods, though they were unable to distinguish between tugs along the fault and tugs across, or normal to, the fault.
"We were really able to tighten the nuts down on whether it is a normal-fault stress change or an along-fault stress change that is stimulating the tremor," he said. The fact that tremors are triggered by along-fault shear stress "means that fluids are probably the explanation."
It may be that tremors only occur on faults where fluid is trapped deep underground with no cracks or fractures allowing it to squirt away, Nadeau added. That may explain why tremors are not observed on other faults, despite intense searching.
"There is still all lot to learn about tremor and earthquakes in fault zones," he said. "The fact that we find tremors adjacent to a locked fault, like the one at Parkfield, makes you think there are some more important relationships going on here, and we need to study it more."
The work was supported by the National Science Foundation and the U.S. Geological Survey.
Science 12 November 2004:
Vol. 306 no. 5699 pp. 1164-1166
DOI: 10.1126/science.1103961
Vol. 306 no. 5699 pp. 1164-1166
DOI: 10.1126/science.1103961
- Report
Earth Tides Can Trigger Shallow Thrust Fault Earthquakes
+ Author Affiliations
- * To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: cochran@moho.ess.ucla.edu
- ↵† Present address: National Research Institute for Earth Science and Disaster Prevention (NIED), Tsukuba-shi, Ibaraki-ken 305, Japan.
Abstract
We show a correlation between the occurrence of shallow thrust earthquakes and the occurrence of the strongest tides. The rate of earthquakes varies from the background rate by a factor of 3 with the tidal stress. The highest correlation is found when we assume a coefficient of friction of μ = 0.4 for the crust, although we see good correlation for μ between 0.2 and 0.6. Our results quantify the effect of applied stress on earthquake triggering, a key factor in understanding earthquake nucleation and cascades whereby one earthquake triggers others.
Tides Can Trigger Earthquakes, UCLA Scientists ReportcienceDaily (Oct. 22, 2004) — Earthquakes can be triggered by the Earth's tides, UCLA scientists confirmed Oct. 21 in Science Express, the online journal of Science. Earth tides are produced by the gravitational pull of the moon and the sun on the Earth, causing the ocean's waters to slosh, which in turn raise and lower stress on faults roughly twice a day. Scientists have wondered about the effects of Earth tides for more than 100 years. (The research will be published in the print version of Science in November.)"Scientists have long suspected the tides played a role, but no one has been able to prove that for earthquakes worldwide until now," said John Vidale, UCLA professor of Earth and space sciences, interim director of UCLA's Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics, and co-author of the paper. "Earthquakes have shown such clear correlations in only a few special settings, such as just below the sea-floor or near volcanoes." "There are many mysteries about how earthquakes occur, and this clears up one of them," Vidale said. "We find that it takes about the force arising from changing the sea level by a couple of meters of water to noticeably affect the rate of earthquakes. This is a concrete step in understanding what it takes to set off an earthquake." Cochran, Vidale and co-author Sachiko Tanaka are the first researchers to factor in both the phase of the tides and the size of the tides, and are using calculations of the effects of the tides more accurate than were available just three years ago. Tanaka is a seismologist with Japan's National Research Institute for Earth Science and Disaster Prevention. Cochran and Vidale analyzed more than 2,000 earthquakes worldwide, magnitude 5.5 and higher, which struck from 1977 to 2000. They studied earthquakes in "subduction zones" where one tectonic plate dives under another, such as near the coasts of Alaska, Japan, New Zealand and western South America. "These earthquakes show a correlation with tides because along continent edges ocean tides are strong," Vidale said, "and the orientation of the fault plane is better known than for faults elsewhere." Cochran conducted a statistical analysis of the earthquakes and tidal stress data, using state-of-the-science tide calculations from Tanaka and the best global earthquake data, which came from Harvard seismologists. This research follows up on a 2002 study by Tanaka. The current research was funded by the National Science Foundation and the Laurence Livermore National Laboratory. Cochran and Vidale found a strong correlation between when earthquakes strike and when tidal stress on fault planes is high, and the likelihood of these results occurring by chance is less than one in 10,000, Cochran said. They found that strong tides impose enough stress on shallow faults to trigger earthquakes. If the tides are very large, more than two meters, three?quarters of the earthquakes occur when tidal stress acts to encourage triggering, she found. Fewer earthquakes are triggered when the tides are smaller. In California, and in fact in most places in the world, the correlation between earthquakes and tides is considerably smaller, Vidale said. In California, tides may vary the rate of earthquakes at most one or two percent; the overall effect of the tides is smaller, he said, because the faults studied are many miles inland from the coast and the tides are not particularly large. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2004/10/041022103948.htm |
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