Earthquakes as waves travelling through the Earth (Michell)
Los terremotos como ondas que viajan por la Tierra (Michell)
- Date
- 1760 · confidence high
- Place
- Cambridge, England, United Kingdom
- Credited to
- John Michell
- Field
- Cosmos & Earth
What was discovered
After the Lisbon earthquake, John Michell proposed that a quake originates at depth and spreads as elastic waves through rock, and suggested locating the focus from the arrival times of the shaking at different places. He is regarded as a founder of seismology.
His paper (Phil. Trans. 1760) explains the effects with an incorrect model of subterranean steam producing the shock, but the wave idea stands.
What it led to
- the basis of locating earthquake foci from arrival times
- a physical interpretation of earthquakes as a wave phenomenon