Scientists develop new way to determine how fast the Indian Ocean is warming by analysing earthquake sounds

Scientists have developed a novel method to determine how fast the Indian Ocean is warming by analysing the sound from seabed earthquakes, an advance that may lead to a relatively low-cost technique to monitor water temperatures in all of the oceans. According to the researchers, including those from the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) in the US, as much as 95 per cent of the extra heat trapped on the Earth by greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide is held in the world’s oceans, making it important to monitor the temperature of ocean waters. [caption id=“attachment_8835921” align=“alignnone” width=“1280”] Scientists said the ocean could be warming by nearly 70 percent greater than had been believed. Image credit: Pixabay[/caption] In the current study, published in the journal Science, the scientists used existing seismic monitoring equipment, as well as historic data on earthquakes, to determine how much the temperature of the ocean has altered and continues changing, even at depths that are normally out of the reach of conventional tools. They assessed a 3000-kilometre-long section in the equatorial East Indian Ocean, and found temperature fluctuations between 2005 and 2016, with a decadal warming trend that “substantially exceeds previous estimates.” By one estimate, the scientists said the ocean could be warming by nearly 70 percent greater than had been believed. However, they cautioned against drawing any immediate conclusions, as more data need to be collected and analysed. Jorn Callies, a co-author of the study from Caltech, noted that the method works by monitoring underwater quake sounds, which are powerful and travel long distances through the ocean without significantly weakening. The researchers explained that when an earthquake happens under the ocean, most of its energy travels through the earth, but a portion of that energy is transmitted into the water as sound. They said these sound waves propagate outward from the quake’s epicentre just like seismic waves that travel through the ground, but added that the sound moves at a much slower speed. The study noted that the ground waves arrive at a seismic monitoring station first, followed by the sound waves, which will appear as a secondary signal of the same event. This effect, according to the researchers, is similar to how one often sees the flash from lightning seconds before hearing its thunder.