What happens to the Earths inner core when theres a high magnitude earthquake?
The short answer is, nothing. Earthquakes don’t originate at the earth’s inner or outer core, they originate much closer to the surface, usually when there is movement between two or more sections of the earth’s crust along breaking lines called “faults”. Sometimes the pieces of crust, called “plates”, can move laterally past each other along a strike-slip type of fault, which is what happened in Haiti. Earthquakes can also occur when a plate, is subducted underneath another plate, or when two plates are pushed against each other and neither one is subducted. All of these movements generate seismic waves which travel through the earth. Two main types of waves are produced from these events, P-waves (primary waves) and S-waves (secondary or shear waves). Geologists can measure the intensity of these waves as they reach their destination point. P-waves will penetrate and travel through the earth’s core, but are refracted or bent somewhat, and S-waves will not penetrate the core. Since S-
