Exam 1
The most famous of all volcanoes probably is Vesuvius, and the most famous of its eruptions are those of 79 ce, which buried the cities of____________.
Pompeii and Herculaneum
__________ are the down-dropped areas in the middle of spreading-center domes that are being pulled apart.
Rift valleys
__________ waves travel only through solids; on reaching liquid or gas, the wave energy is reflected back into rock or is converted to another form.
S
The point on Earth's surface directly ABOVE the point where the fault first ruptures is called the ____________.
epicenter
The rapid increase in human population during the past several centuries is an example of __________ growth.
exponential
The Great Basin region between the eastern Sierra Nevada in California and the Wasatch Mountains in Utah ________________ in response to plate-tectonic forces.
has expanded in an east-west direction
45) A rock subjected to higher temperatures would be expected to behave _____.
in a more ductile manner
As the global human population increases, the death toll from natural disasters is expected to _________.
increase
The Charleston, South Carolina, earthquake of 1886 occurred along a seismic belt that may be related to _________________.
an adjacent oceanic fracture zone on the Atlantic seafloor
The Dead Sea and the Sea of Galilee____
are pull-apart basins and the result of strike-slip motion
Most of the 40 deadliest disasters between 1970 and 2013 occurred in a belt running from China and Bangladesh through India and Iran to Turkey. This area was particularly vulnerable because __________.
it has a high population density
When rock heats and liquefies into magma its volume _____________.
decreases and neighboring brittle rock collapses to make up for the loss of volume
The best time for an earthquake to occur to minimize loss of life is __________.
during the night when most people are home and asleep
When compared to California, seismic energy in the eastern U.S. is transmitted_________.
more effectively in the older, more solid rocks
Earthquakes in Hawaii are mostly related to ________________.
movement of volcanic magma beneath the ground
The dominant type of faulting in the Great Basin region is ________.
normal faulting
Faults on which the dominant forces are extensional are recognized by the separation of the pulled-apart rock layers in a zone of omission; these are
normal faults
When oceanic lithosphere collides with another plate, the ________ in the process of subduction.
older, colder plate turns downward beneath the younger, warmer plate
If basaltic lava reaches the sea or a lake, it cools rapidly into ______ lava.
pillow
The hot-spot-melting-through-lithosphere process forms lines of extinct volcanoes on the ocean floor, from youngest to oldest, __________.
pointing in the direction of plate movement
________ faults are commonly found at areas of plate convergence where subduction or continental collision occurs
reverse
The seismic-gap method of earthquake forecasting works by identifying__________.
segments along a fault that not moved for the longest amount of time
Earth's inner core is a 2,450-km diameter _________ mass with temperatures up to 4,300°C
solid
Earthquakes are most commonly caused by ______.
sudden earth movements along faults
The Richter scale is set up so that for every _______ increase in the amplitude of the recorded seismic wave, the Richter magnitude increases one number, e.g., from 4 to 5
ten-fold
Silicon and oxygen link up to form the silicon-oxygen ________.
tetrahedron
The greatest insurance dollar losses related to natural disasters between 1970 and 2013 occurred in
the United States
The growth rate of the world population equals __________.
the birth rate minus the death rate
The crustal thickness in the Great Basin is __________ than mid-continental North American crust.
thicker than oceanic crust and thinner
Our solar system formed __________.
through collisions of matter within a rotating cloud of gas, ice, dust, and other solid debris
First-order analysis of a seismogram record allows seismologists to do all but which of the following?
to develop a Modified Mercalli Intensity map
The blanket of sediment on the seafloor is ___________ toward the ocean margins.
very thin at the volcanic ridges and thickens
Liquefaction occurs when seismic waves cause __________.
water to be injected into sediment causing the grains to lose cohesion and behave like a fluid
The greatest earthquakes in the world occur ____.
where plates collide with each other
A shield volcano has a great ___________.
width compared to its height
Earth is about __________ years old.
4.5 billion
In 2015 the human population of the world was about __________.
7.3 billion
Over _________ of volcanism is associated with the edges of tectonic plates.
90%
Which of the following states has the lowest earthquake risk?
Florida
Several recent earthquakes in Washington's Puget Sound region were caused by movement of the subducting ___________ Plate.
Juan de Fuca
Which of the following correctly lists the order the layers from the surface of Earth toward the center?
Lithosphere, asthenosphere, mesosphere, and the core (LAM-C)
Seismic waves that travel only near Earth's surface are of two main types: _________ waves.
Love and Rayleigh
The _____ wave travels fastest and moves in a push-pull fashion of alternating pulses of compression (push) and extension (pull).
P (push-pull-p)
All of the continents were once combined into a single supercontinent called _____
Pangaea
Which state accounts for the greatest percentage of all U.S. earthquakes of magnitude 3.5 and above?
Alaska
Based on data for the period from 1970 to 2013, __________ experienced the greatest loss of life from natural disasters.
Asia
Three basic classes of collisions include all BUT which of the following?
Continental plate versus mantle plate
Spreading centers are an ideal location for volcanism because ______________. A) the oceanic plates pull apart causing hot asthenosphere rock to rise and undergo decompression melting to form magma that continues to rise B) they sit above the high-temperature asthenosphere C) the asthenosphere rock has low percentages of SiO2 D) All of these choices are correct.
D) All of these are correct
The viscosity of magma is lowered by__________. A) increasing temperature B) decreasing SiO2 content C) decreasing crystal content D) All of these choices are correct.
D) All of these choices are correct.
The return period of a disaster is the average number of years ___.
between same-sized events