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3 votes
Why is it better to use data from three or more seismic stations to find the epicenter of an earthquake?

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User Variable
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1 Answer

6 votes
Data collected from one seismic station can only determine the distance from the epicentre to this station, thus producing a circle with a radius of that distance. If we have two stations, there will be two circles, and these two circles will have two intercepting points (can't determine the exact location). Therefore we need to add another circle, hence another station to know the exact location of the epicentre.
answered
User Mit
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7.6k points
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