英语新闻周报
英语世界 来源：国际在线 作者： 发布时间：2006-05-31
Icelandic Tin Bath Could Give Earthquake Warnings 
摘要：最近瑞典和冰岛的科学家们就发现，通过观察地震前后温泉地下水的水质变化，专家们将很有可能找到准确预测地震的方法，进而挽救千万人的生命。
A tin bath on the cliffs of northern Iceland, where locals take a dip to treat skin complaints, could help scientists give an early warning of big earthquakes and save thousands of lives.
People from the town of Husavik have long used the piping hot water, pumped up from 4,920 feet below the earth's surface, to treat diseases like psoriasis.
Scientists hope that measuring the changes in its chemical balance will provide a countdown to a quake, something thought impossible until now.
The theory is that pressure changes and movements along geological faults, such as the Mid-Atlantic Ridge which cuts through Iceland, cause the chemical signature of water deep in the earth's crust to change.
A magnitude 5.8 earthquake which struck the Tjornes Fracture Zone near Husavik, Iceland's whale-watching capital, in September 2002 showed just such changes.
"There was a huge peak in the concentration of some chemicals in the water -- some went up 1,000 percent before the earthquake," said Lillemor Claesson from Stockholm University and the Nordic Volcanological Center in Reykjavik.
Until now scientists have been unable to warn people of earthquakes with any accuracy. They can give a broad picture -- that a quake is likely over the next tens of years -- or they can give warnings a few minutes ahead of one. 
Claesson is cautious about claiming too much significance for the research, published this year in Geology, the journal of the Geological Society of America.
But if the kind of changes seen in the water in Iceland -- one of the most geologically active countries in the world -- prove widespread and occur at set intervals they could help scientists make more accurate predictions of when a seismic event will happen.
"Ten weeks before the earthquake we had a really big peak in chromium, and iron. Then five weeks before manganese increases enormously. Two weeks before there was a peak in zinc and one week before there is a copper peak," Claesson told Reuters while gathering new samples from the bore hole.
"The breakthrough is the time-frame. We have one to 10 weeks for the prediction ... People could really benefit from this research."
Scientists and laymen have long tried to predict earthquakes -- some of the most destructive natural forces on the planet.
"You can see different behavior in animals, weird stuff going on in space with the ionosphere and you can see changes in water levels in wells," Claesson said.
"I look at the water-rock interaction and apply that to earthquake research."
The water samples come from a bore hole on the cliffs above Husavik cooled from 257 degrees Fahrenheit down to a comfortable temperatures for the bathers.
Claesson takes her samples before the water runs into the bath -- which overlooks the Atlantic Ocean -- to prevent them from being contaminated.
