The Pulse of the Earth

A sonification of the USGS earthquake catalog in six parts: a week and a day of the world, the link between magnitude and number, the aftershocks of Tōhoku 2011, Kīlauea 2018 and the great earthquakes of 2024. Not a recording from the ground; the data, the scale and the mapping are written in each part. There is no claim of any effect.

Why this order? The first stage is scale: the same data first fits a week into five minutes, then plays the first day seven times slower; an irregular stream separates into single earthquakes. The second stage is magnitude: the week's M ≥ 4.5 earthquakes are lined up by magnitude, and at each half step the number falls several-fold (102, 27, 3, 1, 1); then the aftershocks of the M 9.1 Tōhoku earthquake on a logarithmic time axis, from 528 earthquakes on the first day to 12 on the thirtieth. The third stage is long sequences: four months of Kīlauea (one day in 2.3 seconds) and the 99 M ≥ 6 earthquakes of 2024 (one day in 0.77 seconds). Magnitude chooses the kind of sound: M < 4 thin stone, M 4-5 lower stone, M 5-6 wood, M ≥ 6 gong.

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