Historic Worldwide Earthquakes

[Adam]

Worldwide Earthquakes sorted by Date. I think the increase is due to the fact of how the Mayans computed time. Along the galactic precession.

Here one can see the difference between the number of quakes between the year 2000 and now.

Sorted by Date

earthquake.usgs.gov/regional/world/historical.php

USGS Worldwide Earthquakes between Magnitudes 6 and 8 (this is the graph).
www.thehorizonproject.com/earthquakes.cfm

[ophello]

I think this link is a more clear picture of whats going on with earthquakes:

neic.usgs.gov/neis/eqlists/graphs.html

We continue to be asked by many people throughout the world if earthquakes are on the increase. Although it may seem that we are having more earthquakes, earthquakes of magnitude 7.0 or greater have remained fairly constant.

A partial explanation may lie in the fact that in the last twenty years, we have definitely had an increase in the number of earthquakes we have been able to locate each year. This is because of the tremendous increase in the number of seismograph stations in the world and the many improvements in global communications. In 1931, there were about 350 stations operating in the world; today, there are more than 8,000 stations and the data now comes in rapidly from these stations by electronic mail, internet and satellite. This increase in the number of stations and the more timely receipt of data has allowed us and other seismological centers to locate earthquakes more rapidly and to locate many small earthquakes which were undetected in earlier years. The NEIC now locates about 20,000 earthquakes each year or approximately 50 per day. Also, because of the improvements in communications and the increased interest in the environment and natural disasters, the public now learns about more earthquakes.

According to long-term records (since about 1900), we expect about 17 major earthquakes (7.0 - 7.9) and one great earthquake (8.0 or above) in any given year.