The idea is to find a geologic event that has happened during the semester and which has had environmental consequences and report on it using the outline below. Read the instructions below carefully if you want to maximize your effort.

Each student can complete up to 6 of these. There is a 500 word limit for each report, so use your words wisely. One a week can be handed in ( so you can't wait to do them all until the last week). Some of the grading criteria are described below. They will be handed back during final's week, although you can find out how you did on each one.

This must be your own work - otherwise you are cheating.

Title:

Location of occurrence:

Time of occurrence:

Nature of geologic event:

Loss of life and/or injuries:

Damage to human infrastructure:

Mitigation (potential or realized):

Information sources:

Most of the report components are very straight forward and descriptive. Two, however, will require some thought and research.

• The section on the nature of the geologic event should provide a scientific explanation of the event for the educated lay person. Why did it occur when and where it did? What were the critical geologic factors? What were possible human factors? Was it or could of it been predicted? How often do these types of events occur? A top notch effort will involve some additional research beyond the news coverage of the specific event being recorded.
• The section on mitigation is an analysis of the event from the human perspective. Was anything done to prevent loss of life, injury and damage? Did it work and to what degree? Was this a predictable occurrence? What could of anything been done to prevent damage? How much would of this cost? If nothing was done why? Again, a top notch report will do some additional research to uncover mitigation possibilities.

Information sources are varied. Complete citations must be given that include author, date of publication, title, publisher, pages. If it is a web site include address instead of pages.

Don't hesitate to ask me if you have questions.

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