Studying Earthquakes Through Eyewitnesses Can Be Tricky
Release Date:
January 29, 2021
Scientists rely on seismometers and eyewitness accounts to identify an earthquake’s location, time and magnitude. A new study explores how the latter can be limited by socioeconomic factors, which can create biases in datasets that scientists use to characterize seismic hazards and coordinate emergency response.
As early American pioneers forged a long, arduous path across the country during the Westward Expansion, an earthquake hit what is now the State of Oklahoma on October 22, 1822.
“The trembling and vibrating were so severe as to cause door and window shutters to open and shut, hogs in pens to fall and squeal, poultry to run and hide, the tops of weeds to dip, [and] cattle to lowe [sic],” the Cherokee Advocate reported.