Geology Rocks! But Geography's Where It's At Quiz

Answer: 100 times more powerful

The Richter scale measures the magnitude of an earthquake, based on the amplitude of the seismic waves recorded and their duration. Every whole number is 10 times more powerful than the number before it, so an 8 on the Richter scale is an earthquake 10 times stronger than a 7. That means an 8 is 100 times more powerful than a 6.

The largest earthquakes ever recorded were in Columbia in 1906 and in Japan in 1933, both of which measured 8.9 on the Richter scale.

Answer: The Arctic Ocean

The Arctic Ocean, located in the Northern Hemisphere and mostly in the Arctic north polar region, is the smallest of the world's five major oceanic divisions, and it is also the shallowest with an average depth of 3,450 feet. The center of the Arctic Ocean is covered by a drifting icepack that has an average thickness of about 10 feet. This sea ice covers much of the surface in the winter, but shrinks by about 50% in the summer.

Although the Arctic Ocean is by far the smallest of the Earth's oceans, having only a little more than one-sixth the area of the next largest, the Indian Ocean, its area of 5,440,000 square miles is five times larger than that of the largest sea, the Mediterranean.

Answer: Boron

The Hope Diamond, a Type IIb diamond, is 45.52 carats, and appears deep blue in color because of a trace amount of boron within its crystal structure. Studies say the boron probably came from the Earth's surface and got into water-rich minerals which crystallized during geochemical reactions. The Hope Diamond is notorious for supposedly being cursed with a long-recorded history of its ownership changing many times on its way from India to France to Great Britain and to the United States.

Answer: Arkansas

A Native American tribe called the Arkana lived in the region that is now known as Arkansas. Early French explorers adjusted the name, adding an 's' at the end for pluralization, but an 's' at the end of a word in French is silent. In 1811, explorer Zebulon Pike had also spelled it with an "r". An act of the state's General Assembly legislated that the 'r' be retained and that the 's' at the end would be silent, all to align the spelling with how people had settled on pronouncing the state's name.

Answer: Are magnetic

Lodestones were first discovered in Magnesia, near Greece. They are made of magnetite, a mineral that is a form of iron oxide. They have enough magnetism to be able to attract iron. Early in history they were used in compasses to assist in navigation.

Answer: The Bermuda Triangle is the 2nd most dangerous area for shipping

The Bermuda Triangle in the Atlantic Ocean is more or less bounded by Miami, Bermuda, and Puerto Rico. Famously, popular culture has reported mysterious disappearances of ships and planes in that area, however, documented evidence reveals that a great many of the incidents were inaccurately reported, or exaggerated by authors.

In 2013, a study by the World Wide Fund for Nature determined the world's ten most dangerous waters for shipping; the Bermuda Triangle was not one of them.

Answer: The Star of Adam

The Star of Adam is the only actual gemstone of all those names. It was found in August 2015 in a gold mine in the town Ratnapura, Sri Lanka. Weighing 1,404.49 carats it is estimated to be worth $100 million.

Answer: Bhutan

The Kingdom of Bhutan, in the eastern Himalayas, is a landlocked country that in 2013 had a population of 738,000 (796,504 a decade later in 2023). It is bordered by China to the north and India on the other sides. Monaco has the shortest coastline, but it does indeed have a coastline at 4.4 kilometers. Democratic Republic of the Congo is the largest country (2.34 million sq km) that has the least amount of coastline per area of the overall size.

But it does have a coastline, even though it's only 37 kilometers. Iraq has a paltry 58 km of coastline, paltry considering its overall area.

Answer: Lakes freeze from the bottom up.

When a lake freezes over, it freezes from the surface heading downward. This causes the water below the surface to stay somewhat warmer, due to the surface ice protecting it, and thus allowing fish to survive.

Answer: Martha's Vineyard

Before Chappaquiddick became infamous for Edward Kennedy's driving accident in which Mary Jo Kopechne died, it was home to the Chappaquiddick Wampanoag Indians well into the 19th century. It was a little over 6 square miles in area, and over time it has had strong storms that shaped the area, alternating it between a peninsula connected by a tiny piece of land to Martha's Vineyard and an island separated from Martha's Vineyard by a narrow channel.

At the time of the Kennedy incident, it was an island, but was rejoined to Martha's Vineyard to form a peninsula again for eight years until once again a storm breached the thin strip of land to separate it from Martha's Vineyard. Since then, there have been a small handful of additional flip flops between its status as an island or a peninsula.