Earthquake Monitors Used To Decode Massive Ammunition Explosion
Taylor Creasman/YouTube Ammunition Explosion Iraq The 'cook-off' of an ammunition dump in Baghdad in 2006. Seismometers are used to measure shaking that occues during earthquakes, but they can also measure other kinds of shaking, like the roar of fans after a touchdown and even bear attacks. Now, researchers are paying even more attention to seismometer records, as they can also be used to pinpoint different kinds of weapons, in an expanding field known as forensic seismology. In a paper published today in the Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America, researchers showed that they could decode different kinds of munitions exploding at an ammunition dump in Baghdad using seismometer readings. The seismometer had been placed in Iraq years before, ready to measure large ground-shaking events like...