Understanding the Richter Scale

Check out products related to Geography, Travel and the Outdoors on Amazon: (Paid Link) The Richter Scale is used by scientists to measure the magnitude of earthquakes. The seismic waves of an earthquake that is 6.0 on the Richter Scale are ten times the amplitude of an earthquake that measures 5.0. In terms of energy released, a 6.0 earthquake releases 32 times more energy than a 5.0 earthquake. Since every increase of 1 on the Richter scale has an increased amplitude of 10, the Richter scale is a logarithmic scale rather than a linear one. Attribution: • Tsunami of the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake on March 11 in Isohara, Kita-Ibaraki City, Ibaraki Prefecture, Japan by Edomurasaki, licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported license, Shortened clips from original • Seismograph image, by Yamaguchi先生, licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license, frame size change