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takyon writes:

Gravitational wave detectors could provide advance notice of seismic waves caused by powerful earthquakes (magnitude 8.5 and greater), allowing a little more time for people to evacuate (particularly at coastal regions that may be endangered by a tsunami):

Gravity signals that race through the ground at the speed of light could help seismologists get a better handle on the size of large, devastating quakes soon after they hit, a study suggests. The tiny changes in Earth's gravitational field, created when the ground shifts, arrive at seismic-monitoring stations well before seismic waves.

"The good thing we can do with these signals is have quick information on the magnitude of the quake," says Martin Vallée, a seismologist at the Paris Institute of Earth Physics.

Seismometers in China and South Korea picked up gravity signals immediately after the magnitude-9.1 Tohoku earthquake that devastated parts of Japan in 2011, Vallée and his colleagues report in Science on December 1. The signals appear as tiny accelerations on seismic-recording equipment, more than a minute before the seismic waves show up.

Observations and modeling of the elastogravity signals preceding direct seismic waves (DOI: 10.1126/science.aao0746) (DX)

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