Reports

Varied Tectonic processes, Varied Landforms Discuss

Plan
1.0 – Introduction

Define keywords from the question title above.

Tectonic Processes – Theories, Wegner and Hess’s views – Convection Currents and ‘Pangea’
Tectonic Landforms – Examples
Plate boundaries – Hot spots

Volcanic – Intrusive Landforms – Case Study
                 – Extrusive Landforms – Case Study

Earthquakes – Fault lines, San Andreas Fault

Rift Valley – Great Rift Valley

Collisions Fold Mountains

2.0 Methodology

2.1 Sources Geofiles

Edexcel Book, Byrne et al
Krom (2005)
David Waugh
USGS

Explain why you would use these sites over other websites such as Wikipedia

2.2 Case Studies

Why have you picked these Case Studies?

USA – why picked range of different landforms.

Examples of:
Transform - Examples
Divergent - Examples
Convergent – Examples

Hawaii – Hotspots (above a hotspot)
Iceland – Extrusive (Convergent plate boundaries)

3.0 Analysis

3.1 Volcanic Landforms

3.1.1 Plate Boundaries

3.1.2 Intrusive Landforms – Erosion

3.1.3 Extrusive Landforms

3.1.4 Summarise the following above

3.2 Earthquakes

3.2.1 Plate Boundaries
Landform
Case Study

3.3 Rift Valleys
Landforms
Case Study

3.4 Fold Mountains
Plate Boundaries
Case Study

4.0 Conclusion

Link back to the question
Summarise the main and key points
Links

http://extrageography.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/explain-whytectonic-processes-produce.html


Introduction

Tectonic processes are ‘the structural forces affecting the deformation, uplift, and movement of the earth’s crust’ (USGS, 2014). Tectonic process are a direct impact of heating from within the core, rising and are split into different directions due to convection currents. The theory of ‘Pangaea’ by (Alfred Wegner, 1915;1960) was thought to be that the world was once one large continent and over time and years these have split up therefore forming the different continents we have today. Contrastingly (Harry Hess, 1962) believes that this was caused by low density material that is heated by the earth’s natural radioactivity, therefore forming Convection cells, forming landforms. Tectonic landforms are any of the relief features that are produced chiefly by uplift or subsidence of the Earth’s crust or by upward magmatic movements. They include mountains, plateaus, and rift valleys. (Britannia, 2014).
This report will show the various tectonic processes and landforms. Fold mountains are an example of a tectonic landform and these are mountains formed from the folding of the earth's crust. The extreme pressure forces the edges of the plates upwards into a series of folds. A plateau is a large highland area of quite level land separated from surrounding land by steep slopes. Some plateaus, like the plateau of Tibet, lie between mountain ranges. Others are higher than surrounding land. Plateaus are widespread, and together with enclosed basins they cover about 45 percent of the Earth's land surface. (http://www.edu.pe.ca/southernkings/plateaurh.htm).
The Great African Rift Valley is the south branch of the Afar Triangle, the only one remaining which has not yet been filled by the sea. This is therefore an example of continental rifting. The diverging of the African and Arabian plates and also the magma plume beneath the plates allowed the rift valley to be formed. The plume pushed up the land creating bulges and cracks allowing flood basalts to rise through fissures and add to the gradient and create long mountain ranges. As a result of the divergent plates a small section of land in between these plates breaks away and sinks leaving faults.
The Rift Valley stretches over approximately 5000km from Syria to Mozambique. The width of the rift varies between 30-100kms and the depth also varies from a few hundred to a few thousand metres. The rift is 35million years old and is still growing meaning that eventually East Africa including the horn of Africa: Ethiopia, Somalia and Eritrea will break away and form its own continent.
The San Andreas Fault, which passes through coastal California, is one of the world's best known and most studied plate boundaries. It is a broad fault zone of many faults, about 1300 kilometres long, up to 100 kilometres wide and 20 kilometres deep. The San Andreas Fault is a transform boundary where the continental North American plate and the Oceanic Pacific plate are grinding slowly sideways past each other, creating massive strain in the earth's crust. This stress is released as earthquakes. Most of the fault zone is slowly creeping forward at about 39 millimetres per year—too small to be felt by people and to be measured as earthquakes. What is actually happening is that the rocks on either side of the main faults are locked together for years at a time, but the crust between the faults is moving slowly ahead of the crust along the main faults. Eventually the stress and strain becomes too great along the fault and the stress is suddenly released.
Methodology

For the purpose of this report, I will use a wide range of resources in order to help with my research and the reason for why this was important was that I needed to be able to use well documented reliable sources that I will be using throughout this report will be those of non-biased opinions or facts, so therefore I will use academic, credited sources such as ‘Edexcel A2 book, Byrne et al’, the reason why I would use this source over another such as Wikipedia would be that the source is written by credited geographers such as David Holmes whereas Wikipedia although informative is unreliable because anyone with an account would be able to log in and change the information, so therefore the information that you extract from Wikipedia has a good chance of being incorrect, as a result of this I will also be using accounts from David Waugh, Skinner (2003) and USGS.

2.2 Case Studies

A transform plate boundary is when two plates slide past each other. The plates alternately jerking against each other cause earthquakes to rattle through a wide boundary zone. Crust is cracked and broken at transform margins, but is not created or destroyed. A case study for this would be the San Andreas Fault.

A convergent plate boundary is when the tectonic plates collide together, This in turn causes one or both of the tectonic plates to force up on which forms rugged mountains. Contributing to why Mountains are found on top of tectonic plate boundaries. If one out of the colliding plates is made from oceanic crust, this is subducted into the mantle where it melts forming a magma chamber. When magma builds up it can then be released forming a composite volcano. The friction of the two plates can also cause earthquakes.
A case study for this would be Iceland.

A divergent plate boundary is when the tectonic plates are slowly moving away from each other. As the magma rises this pushes the two tectonic plates apart. Frequent earthquakes occur along the Divergent plate boundary. Earthquakes are in this plate boundary usually have a magnitude of less than 8.0 on the Richter scale (Byrne et.al, 2009). A case study would be The great African rift valley.

Analysis

3.1 Volcanic Landforms

3.1.1 Plate Boundaries

3.1.2 Intrusive Landforms – Erosion

3.1.3 Extrusive Landforms

3.1.4 Summarise the following above

3.2 Earthquakes

3.2.1 Plate Boundaries
Landform
Case Study

3.3 Rift Valleys
Landforms
Case Study

3.4 Fold Mountains
Plate Boundaries
Case Study

4.0 Conclusion

Link back to the question
Summarise the main and key points
Links

 

10.  Evaluate the significance of the level of development in the strategies chosen to manage a range of primary and secondary hazards.

 

PLAN
Introduction

Define:

Tectonic hazards
Primary and secondary
Level of development – LEDC, MEDC and NIC
Modifying loss
Modifying burden
Modifying human vulnerability

Preparation

Hazard management cycle
Use parks to look at how effective
Methodology:

Whittow
Skinner
USGS
Geoactives Geofile factsheets
Chapman et al
UN reports
Why we selected to use these – reliable, well referenced – other academics,
Videos – National Geographic – seconds from disaster
Wave that shook the world
Wikipedia – bias

Case Studies

Japan Tsunami
Boxing day Tsunami
Earthquakes Sichuan and
Volcano – Mont Pinatubo
Monserrat

Analysis 

Subsections of modifying event
Modifying loss
Modifying burden

Conclusion

1.0  Introduction

 

In this report I will be evaluating the significance of the level of development in the strategies chosen to manage a range of primary and secondary hazards. Natural hazards are ‘perceived natural events which have the potential to threaten life and property’ (Whittow, 1980). Primary hazards are the hazards that happen directly after the initial hazard itself, whereas secondary is based on the impacts and or hazards that have occurred within the primary hazard. Primary hazards include Ground Shaking, Ground Displacement, Surface Rupture and Landslides whereas Secondary hazards include Liquefaction, Tsunamis, Fires and Seiches.
Development is the use of resources, natural and human, to achieve higher standards of
living.  (http://www.itseducation.asia/geography/d.htm).

There are three categories of Adjustment and these are ‘Modify the Loss Burden’, ‘Modify the Event’ and ‘Modifying Human Vulnerability’. ‘Modify the Loss Burden’ is broken down into the loss itself, the spread of burden beyond immediate victims, relying heavily on insurance and relief aid. ‘Modify the Event’ is broken down into loss reduction, governmental knowledge of the hazard and how to cope and deal with the potential of the hazard, for instance designing and building earthquake proof buildings, and hazard resistant buildings. ‘Modifying Human Vulnerability’ is adjusting people to the events and better preparing the local people how to cope and prepare for hazards, Also predicting hazards also prepares the residents of that area when it will occur and hopefully providing the government communicate effectively with the residents they will be able to deal better with the hazard and limit loss.

 

1.1 Framework

I will be using a variety of case studies in order to evaluate the significance of the level of development in the strategies chosen to manage a range of both primary and secondary hazards, this will be done by comparing and contrasting the various strategies used before, during and after the hazards occurred in all MEDC’s, LEDC’s and NICs and conclude the successes of the strategies used to react and cope with these hazards in all of the case studies.

 

2.0 Methodology

For the purpose of this report, I will be using a wide range of resources and case studies in order to help with my research and the reason for why this is important was that I needed to use well documented reliable facts, figures and sources to help determine the successes of the strategies used to manage both primary and secondary hazards. I used a variety of credited sources such as ‘Edexcel A2 book, Byrne etal’, the reasoning behind why I used such a documented source over Wikipedia for instance was because the source is written and formulated by credited geographers such as David Homes, whereas Wikipedia although informative is unreliable because anyone with an account can tamper with the information, so as a result the information that you extract has a good chance of being incorrect, therefore as  a result I will be using sources such as Whittow, (1980),Skinner, (2003), A2 Edexcel book and USGS.
As mentioned previously within the methodology I used a variety of case studies to help evaluate the successes of the level of development in the strategies chosen to manage a range of primary and secondary hazards and these were ‘Japan Tsunami, 2011’, ‘Boxing Day Tsunami, 2004’ an example of these would be using geo fact files and these aided within evaluating the facts about the different hazards and the effects they had on each place in regards to the level of development of those nations. The main internet resource that I used was USGS which is the US Geographical survey; this aided and equipped me with the facts on tectonic hazards and secondary impacts of the initial hazards. The reason for why I used a site such as USGS for my data was because as mentioned previously USGS is a credited site and has academic value whereas Wikipedia for instance has tampered information and cannot be relied as 100% accurate. The site was especially useful for case studies such as Sichuan Province Earthquake where this site enabled me to develop my knowledge on the way in which MEDCS deal with hazards before, during and after the occurrence of the hazard. Finally I also used Geo fact files to help broaden my knowledge on the different disasters and whether the level of development does in fact play a factor in the outcome of the hazard.

3.0 Analysis

I will be using case studies over a variety of hazards including earthquakes, Tsunami’s and Volcanoes. The way in which I will evaluate these case studies will be breaking them down into three categories consisting of ‘Modifying loss’, ‘Modifying burden’ and ‘Modifying human vulnerability.
The earthquakes that I think best depicts the significance of the level of development in the strategies chosen to manage a range of primary and secondary hazards is both Sichuan Province, China (2008) and Haiti (2010). Both were rated severely high in regards to the Richter scale as Sichuan was rated as 7.9 whilst Haiti was 7, this shows that the impact would’ve been considerably destructive, as these ratings both have the potential to cause a lot of damage to these areas. Sichuan is situated on a destructive plate boundary between the Indian and the Eurasian Plates, whereas Haiti is situated on a conservative plate boundary between the North American and Caribbean plate boundary. Both of these disasters caused major primary and secondary hazards including ground shaking and surface faulting in Sichuan Province, China and similarly ground shaking took place in Haiti.
Secondary hazards including liquefaction and Landslides in China with 1 million homeless in Haiti due to hundreds of thousands of buildings and homes destroyed.
In terms of Tsunami’s I think Indonesia (Boxing Day Tsunami) in 2004 and Japan Tsunami (2011) again portray the significance of the level of development in the strategies chosen to manage a range of primary and secondary hazards.
Both of these Tsunami’s occurred due to 9 magnitude earthquakes, and these are severely destructive earthquakes and caused a large number of destruction on both occasions.
The main impacts that took place in the Boxing Day Tsunami was that; 250,000 people died over the 13 nations affected worst being Indonesia, two million people were made homeless as a result of the tsunami, Indonesia was the first nation to be hit by the tsunami, moving on to Thailand next and finally Short-term aid, such as water purification tablets, temporary housing and medical supplies were given from international countries. Islands reliant on tourism and fishing, such as the Maldives, had to rebuild their industries. An early warning system between countries surrounding the Indian Ocean has been set up.
Japan’s coastline sank in some places after the quake, the area shifted 8 feet due to the 9 magnitude earthquake that took place prior to the Tsunami, the planet also shifted 4 inches on its axis by the tremor and finally the Tsunami hit the Fukushima nuclear plant affected the nuclear plant in the area. Also there were 145,000 injuries, 125,000 buildings collapsed.
Mount Pinatubo is located in the Luzon Island in the Philippines, this was caused by many earthquakes most notably in the north of Pinatubo, 847 people died following the eruption and After the eruption a lake was formed in the crater, Lake Pinatubo.
Montserrat’s short term responses were evacuating the people of Haiti and this caused the abandonment of the capital, so therefore Haiti relied on international aid in order to redevelop, however Haiti is a tough place to get too so this limited aid and development and ultimately long term responses were; A volcanic observatory was built to monitor the volcano, New roads and a new airport were built, Services in the north of the island were expanded and finally the presence of the volcano resulted in a growth in tourism.

3.1 Modifying the Event

I’ve mentioned in the analysis previously about what took place in all of these disasters, but the way in which they attempted the modify the event before, during and after the event shows the development of the area because they would have the resources in order to do so and effectively as in both earthquake case studies they attempted to rectify the lack of system in place before hand by for instance in Sichuan, China as 2000 excavated earth and used explosives to widen the drainage channel and also the army built drainage channels to reduce the risk of quake lakes failing whereas in Haiti Korean international relief was sent to the epicentre of the hazard in order to mitigate which was effective as this helped evacuate those in the area and save lives in the process. Now in Indonesia and other nations as a result of the hazard have decided to have ‘Disaster awareness/preparedness days’ this is so that people are aware of what to do when a hazard happens but also they have since built buildings with infrastructure in place in order to cope with these hazards thus saving lives and potentially millions of pounds in the process.

3.2 Modifying the loss Burden

Modifying the loss burden is important for all of these nations in order to develop as they have to limit the damage as effectively as they can in order to sustain development. Sichuan decided to install temporary piping and repaired pipes, Temporary house residents in camps that were quickly established, many governments and aid organisations sent aid in order to help the residents of Sichuan, China and also 140,000 troops were sent in by boat, parachute and foot 100,000 volunteers including rescue teams. The reason why this is relevant is because China is an MEDC and they still were badly affected by the hazard so they too had to receive a lot of help from international agencies. Haiti decided to move the capital, many governments and aid organisations sent aid (Red Cross), $7m in 24 hours raised by American Red Cross and camps were quickly established. Whilst in Indonesia $14billion was raised and they decided to take on ‘outside’ aid and they had to rebuild the community.

3.3 Modifying Human Vulnerability

Modifying Human Vulnerability was also important as in Sichuan they had to evacuate 250,000 people downstream of an unstable lake formed by a landslide, they decided to relax the one child policy as a direct result of the deaths and injuries sustained and most importantly the government decided to crack down on any incompetence or corrupt building of schools. In Haiti they used the media to advertise the event, which provided more aid as UNICEF helped and finally the Dominican Republic of Congo set up 8 mobile hospitals sending over 36 doctors in order to help the injured and the victims. Indonesia have now got an Early warning system in place to help the residents for further hazards, food and agricultural organisation supplied foot help and 200 through boats.

4.0 Conclusion

To conclude the significance of the level of development in the strategies chosen to manage a range of primary and secondary hazards was exemplified through the overall responses of each of the hazards mentioned throughout the report. For instance a lot of the nations affected throughout the reports due to the wide variety of hazards covered, had to rely on international aid particularly the LEDC nations such as Haiti who aren’t developed enough in order to sustain development themselves or cover the cost so therefore they would be in debt to other nations in the world because they wouldn’t have been able to pay back the costs, so they are indebted to these other nations whereas the MEDC’s such as Japan, China would be able to receive international aid but not having to rely heavily on it in order to cope or become sustainable as a result.
In china the overall response was rapid, there was a lack of clean water and poor sanitation on which lead to the World Health Organisation to warn the threat of outspread diseases throughout the area, schools and other buildings that were affected, but even those that weren’t had to be checked as a result of poor standard of building and corrupt buildings which lead to a large number of deaths particularly in schools because it took part in the middle of the afternoon meaning that it would affect a percentage of school children etc.. so this showed an MEDC way of responding to the hazard, whereas Haiti is an LEDC and they also received rapid response but lacked major impact, there again was poor sanitation meaning that there was a risk of major disease outbreak across the whole nation, it is a remote/small island which means that it is isolated from other nations which also was a downfall because this impacted with international aid because as it is isolated this meant that it was a hard place to get too, buildings that were affected a large number of them were not rebuilt due to lack of finances due to crippling debt, thus limiting development and this also caused a strain on food and water. Finally in Indonesia there was a rapid response which was affected but was also limiting due to the number of countries that were affected and was in need of aid, disease outbreak took place and also pollution.
To sum up I believe that level of development is a factor is certain strategies chosen but also impact and geographical location should be taken into account.