Tsunami

Tsunami Essay

How peaceful and attracting does this beach look like, isn't it just wonderful? Can you imagine going swimming in that salty warm dreamy beach? But if you look at this HAZARD WARNING ZONE sign, and you know what might happen if you INTEND on going to this beach, it is scary to even pass the warning sign, and not go INTO the water, right?

Tsunami, which is also known as seismic waves- and mistakenly called tidal waves because they are not caused by tidal action- are one of the world’s most dangerous waves that begin growing in height from any small number like 10 cm, and continue growing in height up to about 100 feet or more. A tsunami is a lot of waves made in an ocean or other body of water by an earthquake, volcanic eruption, landslide, or meteorite impact. Tsunami waves are tremendous and can travel very quickly, about 700 km/hr, wow, that’s a fast wave! They usually start growing when they reach the coast, and that's where they start slowing down to be able to hit. A short time before the tsunami wave hits, the water near the shore moves away so the tsunami has space. The first wave isn't usually the largest, every 10-60 minutes additional waves come. When it hits the city, Uh-oh! Everyone's doomed!! :( When these HUGE waves splash into the city, a lot of damage happens. Tsunami waves will destroy the buildings, houses that people live in, cars, banks, streets, basically the whole city! The whole city is very important for people to be able to survive in their environment. For example, without buildings they wouldn’t have a healthy place to live in, and without banks they could be going through a crisis and run out of cash, there are so many reasons why the tsunami is extremely dangerous and why it is important for the city to be safe. More importantly, the people need to be safe! What’s a safe city with not people in it?
The environment is another important thing. Tsunamis cause damage to infrastructure, animals and plants due to the fast waves that destroy everything in their path. For example like trees, crops, bushes, plants, and everything living, also animals, species and fish and a lot more!
If you’re thinking that the only way of protecting yourself from a tsunami is by running, you’re wrong. Tsunamis travel a lot faster than humans do, that’s what makes them SO dangerous! There are several tips that I found on the internet on how you can save yourself before a tsunami happens, during the tsunami and after a tsunami. Firstly, you have to know where the closest high-ground is and how you will reach it. You have to get as far inland as you can! You should always plan how to go far away from a tsunami before it actually happens. On the other hand, during a tsunami you should never go to the shore to watch for a tsunami. Don’t get close to at-risk areas until everything is over. Lastly, after the tsunami listen to radios and see what the people say- if they mention any more possibilities that the tsunami will happen, stay away from the shore, and DO NOT go sightseeing. Also, if you are injured or if your stuff is damaged, take notes and take pictures for insurance purposes.

So as you can see, tsunamis are quite dangerous. One article that I read described where the biggest tsunami occurred- and I found out that in 1964, a gigantic, tremendous tsunami about 200,000 square mile area which took place along the source fault has hit the South East coast of Alaska, the Pacific coast of British Columbia, and west coast of the United States. About 119 people got killed in this huge tsunami along the coast of Alaska, and caused 300 to 400 million dollars in damage of Alaska alone.
We should be very aware of them because we know what will happen by even THINKING about all the damage they can cause; The people and the community, the place/country, and the environment and animals and species will all lose their lives.

Because of all the consequences previously mentioned, it is very important to have good integrated measure to predict tsunamis’ appearances and to avoid human disasters.
There are different types of tsunami warning systems. I will describe one type that uses the bottom pressure sensors.

The fact that the presence of a tsunami can be felt on the sea floor can be used to detect the tsunami. By placing a piece of equipment that can sense the seismic waves’ energy on the seabed, we can be able to accurately sense the presence of a tsunami. One example of the tsunami warning system is given on the picture below. It is NOAA Tsunami Warning System

If you look at the diagram, the sensor will rest at the bottom of the ocean. It will continue to measure the pressure. The spike in the pressure in the ocean floor most likely means that a tsunami has just passed over the sensor! Once the measured pressure spikes, the sensor will send a signal to a buoy with a hydrophone and a transmitter. The buoy would be resting on the surface of the water. Once the buoy has received the signal from the pressure sensor, it will transmit VIA satellite to the Early-warning station the information it has. The Early-warning station will be able to inform the endangered areas of coming danger.

- This is to examine how the tsunami decides whether to inform the public or not!
The tsunami warning system was made to help minimize loss of life and property. It has two sources- the distant source and the local source. Basically, a distant source is when an earthquake happens from one place to another, like from Australia to America, and a local source is when the tsunami happens in the place its’ happening in- for instance, in Alaska.

I've also read some kind of article that explains how elephants in India run to the hills before the tsunami appears in the year 2004. It's amazing how they are capable of hearing the sound waves with much smaller frequency than us people- from 0.001 Hz to 20 Hz. Of course, when they felt it they ran away- maybe people should look more for these natural warning systems, pay more attention to this natural sign and include them with scientific inquiry that they received with some modern kinds of devices.

The global environmental justice between rich and poor countries are known as the powerful and the powerless within the countries. Even though the earthquake and the tsunami are natural phenomena- any natural disaster like volcano eruptions, drouts etc-, there wasn’t anything "natural" about the tsunami disaster and the earthquake disaster. The tsunami before and after is a study of how "natural" disasters can have "unnatural" effects in much poorer regions, going from human made things like poor housing and vulnerable subsistence economies. For example, the Pacific Ocean warning system can warn the Pacific “Ring of fire” countries of an incoming tsunami, but the poorer countries of South and Southeast Asia were not able to afford an Indian Ocean warning system. Now scientists are trying to create a warning system in poorer countries so that they live the same way as rich countries!

After all the online articles and information that I've read, I can conclude that it is very important to have a good emergency infrastructure- which can reach EVERYONE: from fishermen in Indonesia to THE SWIMMER in Hawaii- because that can save a thousand of people's lives!

Bibliography:

1. Pendick, Daniel. "Catching a Tsunami in the Act." Savage Earth. Daniel Pendick,
15 July 2008. Web. 23 Feb. 2011.
tsunami/html/sidebar1.html>.

2. NOAA. "What is a tsunami?" Windows to the Universe. /, 16 Sept. 2007. Web. 27
Feb. 2011. .

3. "The tsunami warning system- how does it work?" Yaquina Bay Communications.
N.p., 10 Aug. 2005. Web. 27 Feb. 2011.
home.cfm?dir_cat=40785>.

4. Claire, Eau. "The waves of devastation." The waves of devastation. N.p., n.d.
Web. 27 Feb. 2011.
tsunami/>.

5. Doesn't, Mention. "Tsunamis." United States search of rescue and Task Force.
N.p., n.d. Web. 27 Feb. 2011. .

Tsunami in Alaska:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yN6EgMMrhdI

Seismograph lab

CREATING A SEISMOGRAPH LAB

Problem:
How to create a seismograph that would properly record the simulated earthquakes.

Guiding Question:
How does the speed of the paper affect the data?

Hypothesis:
If you move the table faster, then the frequency and amplitude of the earthquake waves will be smaller.

Materials:
1. Cardboard box (to hold the paper)
2. Pen (to record the data)
3. String (to hold the pen)
4. Ruler (to hold the pen)
5. Lots of tape (to tape the rulers together)
6. Scissors
7. Notebook (to make the paper higher so the pen can touch it)
8. Chair (to hold the ruler)
9. Table (to make an earthquake)
10. Long paper (to be able to have a lot of trials)

Procedure:
1. Take any cardboard box that is about 40 cm long and 14 cm wide. Put it on a table where you will create the earthquake.
2. Take two rulers of any kind and tape them together to form a 90 degrees angle. Take one end of the ruler and stick it to the side of the seismograph- but make sure you stick them tightly so the rulers will be balanced!
3. For the rulers to be COMPLETELY perfect, take 1-2 heavy metals and tape them on top of one ruler so that the pen is more likely to touch the paper.
4. Take a thick notebook and place it on the cardboard box so that the paper which will be placed on the notebook will be high enough for the pen to touch it.
5. Place a long piece of paper which is about 25 cm long on the cardboard box
6. Then take a school chair and place it on the table- Fix the ruler with the tape into the chair
YOUR SEISMOGRAPH IS CREATED!
7. One partner should shake the table. First he/she should shake the table at slow movement, then at constant movement and finally with strong force. The other partner should move the paper (while the table is shaking) Observe what happens.
8. Repeat the previous steps

This is how your seismograph should look:




Record and analyze:
The data is presented on the pictures of our seismograph


Picture 1:



Picture 2:




Data analysis:
From the pictures above we can see that if we move the paper faster, the graph will look less frequent (like on the first part of the picture.) If we move the paper slower, then the shaking of the table would be fully recorded and the amplitude and frequency will be much higher.

Conclusion:
We can conclude that our hypothesis is correct. If the paper movement is faster, then it will decrease the amplitude of our earthquake waves. In a good designed seismograph you SHOULD NEVER MOVE THE PAPER FAST BECAUSE YOU CAN LOSE THE HIGH FREQUENCY AND THE AMPLITUDE OF THE EARTHQUAKE. I can conclude that this is very important to design a good speed of the paper (it should be slow). Also, the pen has to be strongly tight so that it doesn’t move with the paper. Thirdly, the height has to be exactly corresponding so that the pen doesn’t push on the paper.

Further inquiry:
I have a couple of things to warn myself for the future. Firstly, we unfortunately didn’t take pictures of everything we observed, we should also have done several trials and record each of them ; In the future, I advice myself to do an easy and hard shake with a slow and fast movement of the paper. However, in this case we should have seen the validity of our data and we should have had a good conclusion.

Labs and other Homework

Guiding Questions:
How can you locate an earthquake's epicenter?

Hypothesis:
You locate an earthquake's epicenter by finding the center of three different cities to see where the crossing point is- the edge or point where they cross is the epicenter.


Analyze & Conclude:

1. Observe the three circles you have drawn. Where is the earthquake's epicenter?
The earthquake's epicenter is somewhere between Mississippi and Alabama.

2. Which city on the map is closest to the earthquake's epicenter? How far, in kilometers, is this city from the epicenter?
The city closest to the earthquake's epicenter is Mobile which is in Alabama. It is approximately 100 km.

3. In which of the three cities listed in the data table would seismographs detect the earthquake first? Last?
The closest city city to the epicenter is Houston Texas, the next closest city to the epicenter is Chicago Illinois, and the farthest city from the epicenter is Denver Colorado.

4. About how far from San Francisco is the epicenter that you found? What would be the difference in arrival times of the P waves and S waves for a recording station in San Francisco?
San Francisco is about 3,000 km away from the epicenter. The difference of arrival times of the P waves and S waves for recording station is 4 minutes and 40 seconds.

5. What happens to the difference in arrival times between P waves and S waves as the distance from the earthquake increases?
The difference in arrival times between P waves and S waves increases as the distance from the earthquake increases.

6. When you are trying to locate an epicenter, why is it necessary to know the distance from the epicenter for at least 3 recording stations?
It is necessary to know the distance from the epicenter for at least 3 recording stations because we need to find the crossing points of all three. If you have two circles, then you will have two possible points of earthquakes.


MORE TO EXPLORE:

When I looked at figure 18 (earthquake risks in the U.S) I wasn't quite sure what my earthquake risk is, but in my opinion, the point is not about the highest risk, I assume this is the white gray color. When I looked at the map of earth's Lithospheric plates, I could assume that the cause of the earthquake in this area is in compression of the North and South American plates.

Research the city where you come from to see if there are any Earthquakes which have occurred in your area and if so when and how often? What magnitude are they?
The last recent earthquake that happened in Serbia was in Kraljevo in November the 3rd. It happened about 2 hours after midnight and it was 5.4 degrees by the Richter magnitude scale. The epicenter was 10 kilometers North from Kraljevo in a village called Vitanovac, unfortunately 2 people died during the earthquake. The strongest earthquakes in Serbia was not with the epicenter in Belgrade, but they were located mostly in central Serbia and their average magnitude (the strongest one) is approximately 5.7 degrees of the Richter magnitude scale. The first one was detected in 1893 with the epicenter in Sviljanac which was 5.7 degrees.

Wave Simulator Reflection

Today in science class I watched an amazing video about how waves move when drips fall on water. I found out some really interesting things, it was like I did a real experiment!
If we keep our amplitude constant, and change the frequency, then our wavelength will change too: If the frequency increases, our wavelength will decrease, opposite: Smaller frequency will give us a bigger wavelength. We can observe our wavelength on the graph below the picture – in the axe position. On the other hand, if the frequency is constant and we changed the amplitude, then the wavelength will stay the SAME! However,the position of the crest and trough will just get bigger and bigger.
What I also found interesting was if you put a barrier in the middle of the water space, the waves get slower after they reach the barrier, and even slower when there are two barriers, or slits as it is written in this video.

Waves Lab

Guiding Question:

How does a floating object lying on the water interact with the waves?

Hypothesis:

If the waves are stronger, then the floating object will move in a stronger way.

Materials:

1. Metal tub
2. Water
3. Food color
4. Floating object (plastic cup)
5. Plastic bottle (Half a liter)
6. Marker
7. Paper and pencil (to record the data)
8. Computer (for processing data)

Procedure:

1. Take a big tub and place it on flat table (far away from the edge so it doesn’t fall).
2. Fill half of the tub with water (don’t fill it too much, because your waves might be so strong that you can spill your water!).
3. Add to the water a few drops of food color so the waves would be more obvious to see.
4. Pick an object that can float on water, for example a cup from the plastic bottle, and place it on the water surface, somewhere in the middle.
5. Take a thin pen to create a small wave.
6. Observe and record on your paper what is happening with the floating object!
7. Take a plastic bottle to create a wave.
8. Repeat the steps for creating a wave.

Data Table:



Analysis of Data:

As you can see from the data table above, the strength of the disturbance will not affect the position of the floating object in a big manner. The strength of the waves (its’ amplitude) will only affect how the object shakes, whether it goes more or less up and down, but not in the direction of the moving of the wave.

Conclusion:

What happened? What did the cup do, was it moving or was it just standing in one place and shaking?
After analyzing the data, we can conclude that the floating object would be almost standing in one place, no matter how strong the waves are or how big the disturbance is. It is because ‘the waves travel through water, but they do not carry the water with them’ – this is what I read from our Science Explorer book. The strength of the waves-their amplitude, will only affect how much our object will move up and down.

Further Inquiry:

The major causes of error can be that I used a thin pen to create a wave, and that made the wave reach the floating object hardly. Also, I think that next time I can use a bigger tub so I can easily observe only one direction of the wave-in my case, I had a disturbance from the waves reflected from the tub borders too. For this type of experiment, I could have used more objects, not just a cup. But it is important that they can float. Otherwise, this experiment wouldn’t approve good.

Discovery Activities + Connections

On our last science class we tested how waves interact with each other in three different cases: With no barriers, one barrier and two barriers. We did some kind of experiment, and then drew our observations and made conclusions.
Firstly, we took a tub and filled it halfway through with water and placed it on the table. We used hard clay as the barrier and our fingers for creating a wave.
When we tested how they interact with each other with no barriers, we found out that the waves continue going to their path even though they meet in the middle. They don’t go back and they don’t even go to the side- they continue their movement, however with just another strength- they will become stronger than they were before meeting each other.

Picture 1:



Picture 2:



After this, we put a barrier in the tub filled it with water, and tried to see what happens when waves meet in the middle. When the waves bumped into the barrier they have changed their directions and continued their movement in a new direction. I thought this was normal, because waves can’t go on the barrier or go IN the barrier.

Picture 3:



Picture 4:





Using two barriers on the side of the tub (in a closed manner), and started creating a wave from another edge, we figured out that waves can’t go in the space between the two barriers, waves can only go around it. In another case, if we create a wave inside the barriers but leave a small opening, one part of the waves will go back, and another will pass through a small opening and start spreading around it.
Mrs. M gave us an example about the marine full of boats being closed in an area. When waves are being disturbed, they can’t go in the marine because it is closed- so the boats are safe.

Picture 5:



Picture 6:





What happens when waves hit a surface?
This was another interesting experiment which I thought was simple and obvious that when waves hit a surface, they travel back, I thought it would be like that in the beginning, however, different kinds of balls travel in different ways. For example, if I hit a type of ball (metallic marble) toward a wall, it stays there because it was too heavy to go back. Comparing a metallic marble with a golf ball, there was a big difference. A golf ball immediately goes back when its’ hit. In my opinion, it depends on how hard you hit a ball. If you hit it hard, then the disturbance of a wave goes back really fast. If you hit the ball lightly, it stays next to the wall. My partner and I decided to hit each ball in a uniform speed way, and most of them didn’t travel back, however a smaller number of them traveled back.
As you can see, when a ball or in our case wave hits a surface, it travels back by the same angle in which it hits it.




In conclusion, we were given the assignment to connect these discovery activities with the section we had to read. The section talks a lot about what we did in class, this means that it was easy for me to connect it to the discovery activities.
In the first discovery activity, where I had to answer: How do waves interact with each other with no barriers, one barrier and two barriers? Having one starting wave begin from an edge, and another from a totally different side. When they meet in the middle they will continue their movement in the same direction but with greater force going up and down. This is called a positive interference, or a constructive interference, and it is occurring because the amplitude of our waves are adding to each other and are becoming bigger.
With one or two barriers, the waves will certainly reflect from the barrier in the angle which is equal to the angle of incidence. This is occurring because of a reflection, also, when we have two barriers with a small opening between them (picture 6) we saw that some of the waves were reflected. But also some parts of it passed through the opening and started spreading through the water, this is called a diffraction.


In the second activity, we had to conclude: What happens when waves hit a surface?
When a wave hits a surface by some angle (called an incidence angle) it goes back, in a changing direction. This other angle is called a reflection angle. These two angles are always equal. The surface where the balls were hit is called a reflection surface.

FoodINC Reflection

1. After watching Food Inc, what are your impressions of how science of food industry, technology of food industry, and society are interrelated?

I think that food industry, its’ technology and society are connected as the following:
First come a lot of hungry consumers which don’t have enough time to make and eat healthy, not so good looking food. -Is it going to be so tasty without all those chemicals that will be added by the food industry??? No!
Then comes the food industry, which gives the animal, for instance a cow, the fat food to make it better and tastier for us. In the first place, the saddest thing to me, the death of the animal, but certainly it starts off with a circle of an endless production, which should be faster, cheaper, and with a lot additives and chemicals… that’s the time when factories start making the product or packaging for the animal meat to be put in. We, the consumers buy that fat, tasty looking animal to eat at home. We gain the animals fats because we have eaten their meat, so we full-fill our fats, right?
Thirdly, there is one more problem: we also gain all those chemicals from animal meat, and we are not aware of all the consequences on our health while we enjoy in eating the genetically tastiest food ever!

2. How did the film describe science & technology as a positive or negative impact on society or the environment?

In my opinion, science and technology are described to have a negative impact both on society and the environment. Factories have fewer workers involved because the machines do everything by themselves; however they also can create a huge amount of carbon dioxide and other pollutants which harm the environment. But factories are built to full-fill the needs of the hungry, fast rising human population and so that’s why they are necessary to exist but their technologies are sometimes bad for consumers, because we can intake things that are genetically modified which is not healthy because who know what kind of chemicals they include. Take a hamburger from McDonalds. It is not healthy, doesn’t have any nutrients, and is genetically modified so it is not real at all but it looks and tastes really great!

3. How do our consumer choices affect what is out on the market and therefore, our own species survival?

Consumer choices are not often very smart, but we should really be aware of what we are taking inside of our bodies because our healthy choices will affect our own survival. My mother was retelling a movie to me which is created by a man who had eaten only McDonalds for a month, and at the end of that month, he was much heavier and fatter, exhausted and with a lot of disease that can just a person have who is for example chronically sick. (That is the reason why she doesn’t allow me to go to McDonalds.) So, the point is that we should be very careful when buying and eating something, however, marketing, I admit, is a miracle! We care mostly about taste, and less about health; we, as consumers look at how, or if the food package is nicely decorated, and attractive to us. Also, we look at TV commercials which are also suited in the technology group. But, if we stop buying products, they will not be out in the market anymore because it is a waste of the producers’ time and money to make it. So we should try to raise our own awareness of what we want to eat, and that will direct industry to make healthier products.

4. How are we as humans connected to how the Earth is used?

Humans have mainly caused problems on the Earth, because they are on the top of food chain, the most intelligent mammals, but the ones that don’t use the Earth just to survive, more to enjoy and obstruct. We caused a lot of disturbance using much more spaces and resources than we really need, also in not recycling, polluting waters, airs, causing global warming etc. we kill mammals and animals to get our food, we cut down trees to get materials such as paper, cardboard and so on. We have done a VARIETY of things to our Earth, and the only way we can change this is by caring, and respecting the environment around us. For instance, we can buy food cans, we can recycle the things that are recyclable, we don’t need to pollute the waters by throwing poisonous trash in there and harming the air by causing climate change with gases coming out of our roof, we have to respect everything around us, because everything around us is ideally our environment and our society. We can help.

5. A few ideas that popped up in conversation throughout the movie were:

When do we say "no" to more high tech devices and go back to what caused the problem in the first place? Why are we only into the "HOW" things work and not the "WHY" things don't? What did this farmer mean?

The questions that the farmer has asked are to me very suspicious. In my opinion, people think that they cannot help, and that they cannot do anything to make our environment a better place, because they think that others don’t care, so why waste their time. But they are wrong, every little piece they waste is trouble for the WHOLE Earth. That is a big problem, and that really affects the Earth. The other possible reason is because it can be expensive for them so they don’t want to waste time and money on that. Anyways, back to what I was talking about, humans think that they cannot help, so they make up things that are already possible for them to do, just talk about how things work, and leave out the why because they don’t want to waste time learning more .

6. What is the difference between natural farming and industrial farming? Which is better? Are they both necessary for human survival? Why or why not?

Natural farming is much better and causes non-use of technology. The difference between those two things is that natural farming is when farmers use their own hands to pick up food and vegetables, it involves less industry, less chemicals, but also less resources obtained, ex. less food, or meat. In opposite, the industrial farming is when people use technology to do the work for them, it includes big land spaces, machines and chemicals, but all these things should be very controlled, for me, it looks more as “allegedly”. Natural farming is better because it includes clean and not genetically modified, but it cannot give enough food for all people on the Earth, that’s why industrial farming is also necessary!

7. If technology and industry have improved so much that we are getting faster, fatter, bigger, and cheaper, how are science and technology held responsible for improving or ruining human health and survival?

Human health and survival depend on a lot of things. First of all, space and nutrients! They both should be healthy, but, unfortunately, they are not, because everything is getting faster, fatter, bigger, cheaper and less healthy for sure. So the more fats from an animal we gain, the worse it is for us. I would say that technology makes some kind of fake food for us, and it can ruin our health. This also goes to animals. Animals that eat that kind of food are poisoned. Then when we eat the animal, we get poisoned too. So it is a problem anyhow!

8. What economic costs, environmental costs, ethical costs, health costs, and cultural costs did you observe while watching the film?

Everything costs, but the human health most-for example if u are sick, you can’t go to work, you can’t earn money, and you have to pay insurance, medicaments etc. So you waste a lot of money by getting healthier, instead of just keeping your good food choice. The ethical cost can be seen by the unfair choices that are offered by factory owners-buying cheap and tasty, no matter if it’s not healthy. Environmental costs are also obvious, spreading diseases, pollution, occupying spaces etc.

9. Finally, state your final thoughts about this film and any changes you see happening in the food industry in the future or even your own eating habits.

I think that this movie stated the right facts, and everything was very well said. I agree with most of the things, and I learned, well not learned, but figured out why my mom was so against eating my favorite McDonalds meal-now I have much more understanding and facts that I can tell her to support her.