The hypocenter or hypocentre (literally: 'below the center' from the Greek υπόκεντρον), refers to the site of an earthquake or to that of a nuclear explosion. Greek (el ελληνική γλώσσα or simply el ελληνικά — "Hellenic" is an Indo-European language, spoken today by 15-22 million people mainly In the former, it is a synonym of the focus; in the latter of ground zero.
Earthquakes
The location of an earthquake's hypocenter is the position where the energy stored in the strain in the rock is released, which occurs at the focal depth below the epicentre. The epicenter or epicentre is the point on the Earth 's surface that is directly above the Hypocenter or focus the point where an Earthquake The focal depth can be calculated from measurements based on seismic wave phenomena. Seismic waves are Waves that travel through the Earth, most often as the result of a tectonic Earthquake, sometimes from an Explosion
As with all wave phenomena in physics, there is an uncertainty in such measurements that grows with the wavelength so the focal depth of the source of these long-wavelength (low frequency) waves is difficult to determine exactly. A wave is a disturbance that propagates through Space and Time, usually with transference of Energy. Physics (Greek Physis - φύσις in everyday terms is the Science of Matter and its motion. In Physics wavelength is the distance between repeating units of a propagating Wave of a given Frequency. Very strong earthquakes radiate a large fraction of their released energy in seismic waves with very long wavelengths and therefore a stronger earthquake involves the release of energy from a larger mass of rock.
Air burst explosions
The term hypocenter also refers to the point on the surface of the earth directly below an explosion above the ground, in the atmosphere. In principle, it applies to any such explosion but the term was not found to be necessary until the very large explosions of nuclear bombs became a reality. In this context, the term 'ground zero' was synonymous with hypocenter, though the ground zero term has been rendered less precisely useful, as it has been used by journalists and others ever more loosely. The term Ground Zero may be used to describe the point on the earth's surface where an explosion occurs
See also
- Epicentre
- Ground zero
- Hiroshima Peace Memorial - The closest structure to withstand the 1945 nuclear explosion, it was 150 meters / 490 feet away from the hypocenter. The epicenter or epicentre is the point on the Earth 's surface that is directly above the Hypocenter or focus the point where an Earthquake The term Ground Zero may be used to describe the point on the earth's surface where an explosion occurs Hiroshima Peace Memorial, commonly called the Atomic Bomb Dome or A-Bomb Dome ( Japanese: 原爆ドーム Genbaku Dome) in Hiroshima
Dictionary
hypocenter
-noun
- (geology) (US) alternative spelling of hypocentre. The correct term for the focus of an earthquake, directly under the epicenter
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