The links below present examples of earth sounds recorded by seismometers. Seismometers are different from microphones and hydrophones in that they are sensitive to lower frequencies than people can hear, and they record a single direction of ground vibration.

These sounds are also being released as Podcast episodes for Apple iTunes and iPod listeners. Subscribe to http://www.seismo.unr.edu/sounds/sound-of-seismic.xml. A new episode will be posted each month.

All of the sound and graphic files presented in the pages below have been authored by John N. Louie and are in the public domain, so are free for any use. All text is copyright 2001-2006 John N. Louie.

Example Sounds:

• Earthquake scenarios affecting Nevada urban areas
• An earthquake sequence in New Zealand
• Singing sands at Sand Mountain, Nevada
• Simulated earthquake in southern Nevada
• Gold mine blast in northern Nevada
• Microtremor at the Reno/Tahoe Airport
• Microtremor at Mud Island, Memphis
• A 3-d seismic survey record

The topmost or leftmost seismogram strip plays into the left ear, and the next adjacent strip plays into the right ear. Most of the seismograms continue to alternate into the left and right channels in this manner.

The color of the image is keyed to the sound amplitude. The amplitude usually represents the vertical ground particle velocity, and not the total sonic pressure. Red colors show strong upward particle velocity, often associated with increasing sonic pressure in the ground. Blue colors show strong downward particle velocity, often associated with decreasing sonic pressure. White indicates little or no vertical particle velocity, and little or no sound output. But elastic waves in the ground may still have substantial amplitude, even when there is no vertical particle velocity, sonic pressure, or sound heard from these files. The amplitude would be in the transverse waves not seen in the vertical vibration direction.

Dr. Florian Dombois has a well-referenced set of presentations on-line for Auditory Seismology.