This is a page about the Pelicanbill World Earthquakes website.

My Aims for Pelicanbill.com

I have tried to present the USGS Earthquake data in a way that is perhaps more interesting and informative than just different-sized spots on a map. Of course, I have that view too, but I also have graphs and tables which show recent trends and how the Earth is relating to us. I believe that it is not just a lump of rock floating around in the universe but, in its own way, has a life system of its own. It may work more slowly than ours, but I think that the health of our piece of rock should be our concern - after all we all depend on it for our life.

Like us, the Earth has its stresses and tension points too and where these build up, it has to find some way to release this tension for its own wellbeing. In areas of plate boundaries the stress sometimes becomes too great and one plate slips, causing a shock wave or vibration which travels through the crust dislodging anything that is too rigid.

Objective vs Subjective

Those of us who have an interest in earthquakes, often tend to get caught up in the bigger picture of earthquake activity and we ignore the real-life aspects of the people going through the events themselves. We become removed from the actual event and see it as if we are a scientist studying a graph.

Real Life Earthquake Disasters

All of the Earthquakes Maps shown on this site can be used to zoom in on the areas where the event occurred. Although many large events occur in uninhabited areas of the world, such as remote ocean areas, many also occur where the local population is suffering considerably as a result of the earthquake. An example would be the large Sichuan Earthquake in China in 2008.

What we see here in the Earthquake Graphs or on an Earthquake Map is often a major devastating and life-changing event to many people involved. It is important that we do not lose sight of the real-world impact of these events.

Looking for Patterns

Looking for patterns in the chaos of seemingly random earthquake events is a long and drawn-out affair, and probably totally useless, however I am sure there are reasons somewhere behind the way the earth reacts the way it does. Like dogs shaking off the fleas in its coat, the earth is perhaps trying to rid itself of its human fleas which are sucking its blood and not-so-slowly killing it. As all the scientists say, the Big One should be due any day soon, and maybe we will see the build-up to it on these pages. I hope not.

Your Suggestions

I am not an expert in Earthquakes, I have no qualifications in this area and it is just a personal hobby of mine. If I make mistakes or huge erroneous assumptions when I talk about these things, it is only because I dont know any better. If you find that my information is incorrect, or my calculations are wrong, please use the Contact Us form accessed from the World Earthquakes home page to tell me about it and I will make corrections. Please also use the Contact Us form if you would like to see different eathquake graphs or if you have other suggestions for earthquake-related pages on this site.

Finally...

So....with that said, I offer these pages only as interesting areas for investigation and the for hypothetical conclusions and wild theories that I personally have drawn from looking at the raw USGS data in the database. I hope that you find this site about Earthquake Graphs, Maps and Tables both interesting and informative. Thanks.

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