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10 February 2023

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Turkey's earthquake was so strong, its energy could power New York for four days, seismologist says

The earthquake that has so far killed more than 30 000 people in Turkey and Syria was strong enough to power all of New York City for more than four days, a seismologist said. The energy released by the 7.8 magnitude quake on Monday morning was equal to around 32 petajoules, Januka Attanayake, a seismologist at the University of Melbourne in Australia said. That amount of energy is enough to generate 8.88 million megawatts continuously for one hour. It's also equivalent to the energy released by nearly 7,25 million tons of TNT.
 
The Times noted that another seismologist, Renato Solidum, told the outlet in 2013 that a 7,0 magnitude earthquake created as much energy as 32 of the atomic bombs that were dropped on Hiroshima.
 
The local magnitude scale, also known as the Richter scale, is logarithmic, meaning each time the magnitude goes up by 1, the energy released by the earthquake is stronger by around 31,6 times.
 
So, when comparing a 7.8 magnitude earthquake to a 6,7 quake, like one that struck the same region in Turkey in January, 2020, the former releases almost 45 times more energy.
 
 
Source: The New York Times

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