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2) What information am I looking for? If you dont know what youre looking for
its very unlikely that youll find it!
How long (time)
3000 kilometers!
All of these problems are the same.
Given the time, find the distance.
Given the distance, find the time.
And it doesnt matter whether you
are given P or S wave travel time
as long as you are careful to use
the correct line and, most important:
OK, lets try another type of problem involving both P and S waves. Heres
an example...........................
It takes P waves 7:20 (7 minutes and 20 seconds) to travel from an earthquake
epicenter to a seismic station. How long will it take S waves from the same
earthquake to reach the seismic station?
What do we know? We know P wave travel time is 7:20
What are we trying to find?
NO!
We have to divide the problem into 2 parts. First, we do just what we did in
the previous problem. We use the P wave travel time to find the distance
to the seismic station and then.................................
We use the distance to the seismic station to find how long it took S waves
to travel that same distance.
Lets see how its done....................................
One last kind of problem to become familiar with. Sometimes, instead of giving you
the difference in arrival times, you will be given a seismogram (a record made by a
seismograph) instead.
Using this seismogram
find when the P waves
and the S waves arrive.
Do this by carefully
making a mark at the
P wave and S wave
arrival times.
Now count the number of
minutes between the
arrival of P and S waves at
the station.
From this point on its just like the previous problem: If the difference in arrival times
between P and S waves is 6 minutes, how far is the seismic station from the
epicenter of the earthquake?
Best advice:
Many students read a question and immediately realize that they do
not know what to do. They feel they are completely lost. In that case
theres one important thing to remember:
DO SOMETHING! Just dont sit there! Do something with the information
you have. For instance, if the question mentions P waves and gives a
distance, use that to find a travel time.
If the question gives a travel time for S waves use that to find a
distance to the epicenter.
Now you have a little more information than you had before. Re-read
the question. Be sure you know what youre looking for and see if
you now have enough information to get the answer.
Never give up. Never let yourself sit there doing nothing!