Here's What a Map of 114 Years of Earthquake Epicenters Looks Like

As John Nelson writes on his blog -- IDV User Experience -- this map may look like "fleet of Nickelodeon tankers spilled the world's supply of floam," what it really represents is more than 100 years of earthquake data.

With data from the Northern California Earthquake Data Center, compiled by the U.S. Geological Survey and the University of California-Berkeley, Nelson color coded epicenters since 1989 based on magnitude and "glued" that data onto a NASA Visual Earth Image.

He acknowledges that most of the "hard core" data collection really didn't get started until the 1960s, but still "if historical epicenters were floaties, you could walk from Seattle to Wellington."

He also says that the areas with more sensors are able to record more seismic activity, thus giving those them more data as well.

In late May, the Blaze reported on Nelson's image of 56 years of tornado tracks. He has more recently animated this data based on tornados from 1950-2011 by month and year. Check them out: