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Avalanche vs Earthquake - What's the difference?

avalanche | earthquake |

As nouns the difference between avalanche and earthquake

is that avalanche is a large mass or body of snow and ice sliding swiftly down a mountain side, or falling down a precipice while earthquake is a shaking of the ground, caused by volcanic activity or movement around geologic faults.

As a verb avalanche

is to descend like an avalanche.

avalanche

Noun

(en noun)
  • A large mass or body of snow and ice sliding swiftly down a mountain side, or falling down a precipice.
  • A fall of earth, rocks, etc., similar to that of an avalanche of snow or ice.
  • A sudden, great, or irresistible descent or influx of anything.
  • Anything like an avalanche in suddenness and overwhelming quantity (like a barrage, blitz, etc).
  • Synonyms

    * snowslide, snowslip

    Verb

    (avalanch)
  • To descend like an avalanche.
  • To come down upon; to overwhelm.
  • The shelf broke and the boxes avalanched the workers.

    earthquake

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • A shaking of the ground, caused by volcanic activity or movement around geologic faults.
  • * 1590 , (Edmund Spenser), The Faerie Queene , III.2:
  • Her alablaster brest she soft did kis, / Which all that while shee felt to pant and quake, / As it an Earth-quake were: at last she thus bespake.
  • * 2006 , Declan Walsh, The Guardian , 6 Oct 2006:
  • Last year's earthquake crushed his house, his livelihood and very nearly his leg, he said, pointing to a plastered limb that refuses to heal.

    Synonyms

    * earthdin * quake * seism * temblor * terremote * tremblor * tremor

    Derived terms

    * earthquake-prone

    See also

    * aftershock * earthquake engineering * fault line * Richter scale * seismic * seismograph * seismologist * seismology * tremor * tsunami