I get really annoyed whenever there’s an earthquake and people say “it’s all because of global warming”. There is no doubt that climate change influences hurricanes and droughts, but earthquakes, tsunamis and volcanoes are all down to Earth’s natural processes.
Well at least that’s what I used to think, up until now. New research suggests that maybe I shouldn’t have been getting so annoyed with those people after all, because there may actually be a direct link between climate change and earthquakes. How on Earth is that possible, because what has the atmosphere – which causes global warming – got to do with the inner workings of our planet (which cause earthquakes)?
The science behind it is surprisingly simple. Because ice sheets become so huge, they ‘glue’ the land underneath them together. This prevents earthquakes happening because the power of the earthquake would not be enough to overpower the force of the ice which is holding the land together.
So any stress building up between Earth’s tectonic plates carries on building up and building up, unable to be released. (In case you don’t know, tectonic plates are the massive lumps that make up the Earth’s surface, and can cause earthquakes by sliding past each other or colliding.) This is great as long as the ice is there, because it means there are very few earthquakes.
The problem comes when the ice melts: once the ice isn’t there to ‘glue’ the tectonic plates together, all the stress between the tectonic plates will suddenly be released. Depending on how fast the ice is melting, this stress could be released in a series of mini-quakes (if the ice is melting slowly) or a disastrous giant quake (if the ice melts really fast).
Isn’t this all just a big scare story – where’s the evidence? Well actually, the whole study was based on real evidence. Scientists found that a series of earthquakes near the Arctic around 10,000 years ago matched the time when the ice started melting, after the end of the last Ice Age. And they even managed to trace the quakes going gradually northward, as the ice retreated further north.
Every day the effects of human-induced global warming seem to get worse and worse. But it doesn’t have to be that way – small changes to our lives really can make a big difference.
Filed under: Exploration, Nature, Science, Technology | Tagged: Antarctica, Arctic, disaster, earthquake, earthquakes, Environment, geography, geology, glaciers, global warming, green, ice, ice sheets, natural disasters, news, tectonic plates
good.keep it up
You are an idiot. Ooops. You sound like an idiot. You may very well not be one. You look back 10,000 years for earthquake activity AS YOUR EVIDENCE. My God, Man! Come up with some real time actually happening proof.
Oh, by the way, the ice that covered all of Canada and most of North America has b melted (100% before the arrival of MMGW) and the continent has been rebounding since then because the weight has been removed.
As for the quakes following the melting ice front, pay attention. THE ICE HAS GONE ALREADY!!!
^Oooh, someones a bit grouchy!^
I think you’re right. it’s a brilliant theory. keep up the good work!
The plate tectonic NOT makes the earthquakes.
The moon makes the earthquakes as raising the earth crust.
See more than 800 world earthquake predictions who happened.
There will be an strong earthquake in Costa Rica on the 28th of March 2009.
YouTube: BOYKOILIEV2008
ok i dnt wanna be mean but this really realllly sounds like bullshit. srsly. correct me if im wrong but arent the plates like miles and miles below the ocean floor? how is it possible that the ice caps are that massive that they can even reach plates much less “glue the together”. im confused.