Skip to content
Ellis Abel Learns.

In my own words · Washington, DC

Why I love earthquakes

A jagged crack running across desert ground with a yellow tape measure stretched over it, marking surface rupture from the 2019 Searles Valley earthquake. Real USGS photograph used on the Ellis Abel Learns "Why I Love Earthquakes" page — read by families in Washington, DC.
A jagged crack running across desert ground with a yellow tape measure stretched over it, marking surface rupture from the 2019 Searles Valley earthquake. Ben Brooks and Todd Ericksen, USGS · Public domain
  • The ground is made of pieces and they move.
  • A machine can feel a shake from the other side of the world.
  • Knowing early gives people seconds, and seconds matter.

You can love earthquakes in Washington.

What it really is

An earthquake is rock slipping along a fault and sending waves through the ground.

Three things to try today

  1. Look up how many earthquakes happened today.
  2. Find the closest one to you.
  3. Find out what the number after it means.
USGS scientists Alexandra Pickering, Suzanne Hecker and Aaron Page stand in an excavated trench pointing at the fault line exposed in its wall. Real USGS photograph used on the Ellis Abel Learns "Why I Love Earthquakes" page — read by families in Washington, DC.
USGS scientists Alexandra Pickering, Suzanne Hecker and Aaron Page stand in an excavated trench pointing at the fault line exposed in its wall. U.S. Geological Survey, Earthquake Hazards Program · Public domain

For the grown-up reading this

The Washington–Arlington–Alexandria, DC-VA-MD-WV metro area has about 6,465,724 residents, ranking 7th in the country. The question is not whether Washington, DC has children who love earthquakes. It is whether anyone told them that counts as something.

The USGS earthquake feed updates every few minutes and is the best free data set for children.

If the kid who loves this is a girl

Read what one popular teacher said to one little girl who took out the classroom trash without being asked — and what that girl did with the rest of her life.

Girls are great at math — Washington, DC →

Love something else too

Hundreds of dinosaur bones still embedded in the tilted rock wall inside the Dinosaur Quarry building at Dinosaur National Monument. Real USGS photograph used on the Ellis Abel Learns "Why I Love Fossils" page — read by families in Washington, DC.Why I love fossilsThe historic quarry building at Dinosaur National Monument, built over steeply tilted Jurassic rock layers that hold a dinosaur bone bed. Real USGS photograph used on the Ellis Abel Learns "Why I Love Dinosaurs" page — read by families in Washington, DC.Why I love dinosaursHurricane Juliette photographed from the Terra satellite as a huge white spiral of cloud with a clear eye at its centre. Real NASA photograph used on the Ellis Abel Learns "Why I Love Weather" page — read by families in Washington, DC.Why I love weatherThe branching channels of the Godavari River delta meeting the Bay of Bengal, photographed by the crew of space shuttle Endeavour. Real NASA photograph used on the Ellis Abel Learns "Why I Love Rivers" page — read by families in Washington, DC.Why I love riversThe dark ragged skyline of a Douglas fir forest at Point Reyes, California, silhouetted against a pale grey sky. Real USGS photograph used on the Ellis Abel Learns "Why I Love Forests" page — read by families in Washington, DC.Why I love forestsA honeybee queen marked with a yellow dot on her back, surrounded by worker bees on the honeycomb. Real USGS photograph used on the Ellis Abel Learns "Why I Love Bees" page — read by families in Washington, DC.Why I love beesA cultivated agricultural field stretching to the horizon with a wetland strip along its edge. Real USGS photograph used on the Ellis Abel Learns "Why I Love Farming" page — read by families in Washington, DC.Why I love farmsAn alligator moving through a brackish waterway at Kennedy Space Center, only its eyes and back above the water. Real NASA photograph used on the Ellis Abel Learns "Why I Love Animals" page — read by families in Washington, DC.Why I love animals

Near Washington

Why I love earthquakes, everywhere in the US · All things to love · STEM jobs you could do · Summer camps in Washington