Total energy released2 quintillion J
2 sextillionCricket chirps
909 billionBig Macs
1.9 trillionSnickers bars
~2 exajoules; equivalent to ~480 megatons of TNT
Photo from Wikimedia Commons
Magnitude 9.0 Earthquake
When tectonic plates slip and the whole planet rings like a bell/Events & Phenomena
A magnitude 9.0 earthquake releases roughly 2 exajoules of energy, equivalent to about 480 megatons of TNT. The 2011 Tohoku earthquake off Japan's coast was a 9.1, shifted the Earth's axis by an estimated 10 cm, and shortened the day by 1.8 microseconds. Seismic waves from such events travel through the planet at 8 km/s and can be detected on seismographs on the opposite side of the globe. Only five M9+ earthquakes have been recorded since 1900.
Measurements
Rupture duration360 s
1.6 millionthsDog years
3 tenthsHalftime shows
90Silences
The 2011 Tohoku M9.1 rupture lasted ~6 minutes along the fault
P-wave velocity (crust)8,000 m/s
258Highway cars
615,385Garden snails
1,194Cyclists
Primary (compression) waves through Earth's upper mantle
Fault slip distance50 m
38.5Bathrobe lengths
278Carrot lengths
104Office chair heights
Maximum displacement along the fault plane; 2011 Tohoku measured ~50 m
Rupture zone length500,000 m
62.5 billionRed blood cells
10,000Olympic pool lengths
1.4 trillionthsOrion Nebula diameters
~500 km for a M9.0; the 2004 Sumatra M9.1 ruptured ~1,300 km
Tsunami speed in open ocean200 m/s
2.6 hundredthsISS orbital speeds
2.86Golf ball drives
~720 km/h; the speed of a jet airplane across deep ocean