Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun The surface position directly beneath the center of a nuclear explosion.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun US Alternative spelling of hypocentre.

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Ancient Greek ὑπό (under) + κέντρον (center)

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Examples

  • He wasn't near the hypocenter, or ground zero, for the blast in August 1945, but went there two days later, putting him in a category known as "early entrants."

    Past Haunts Tally of Japan's Nuke Crisis Yuka Hayashi 2011

  • As a 13-year-old middle-school student, he approached the hypocenter two days after the blast, he says, to look for bodies of his classmates.

    Past Haunts Tally of Japan's Nuke Crisis Yuka Hayashi 2011

  • Those reduced by human hands were cremated on makeshift altars at a temple that once stood at the present site of the mound, one-half mile from the hypocenter of the atomic blast.

    Greg Mitchell: Under a Mound in Hiroshima: A City of Ashes the Size of Santa Fe Greg Mitchell 2011

  • Earthquakes with magnitudes less than 3.4 are generally not felt by people unless they are very shallow and you are standing very close to the epicenter (point on the earth's surface above the hypocenter).

    Yellowstone Lake Earthquake Swarm Summary as of 8 January 2009 2009

  • Kengo Futagawa (59 at the time) was crossing the Kannon Bridge (1,600 meters from the hypocenter) by bicycle on his way to do fire prevention work.

    AUGUST 6, 1945 / A DAY OF INFAMY 2008

  • (The ground directly below the point where the bomb exploded is referred to as the hypocenter.)

    AUGUST 6, 1945 / A DAY OF INFAMY 2008

  • My friend, Sumiteru Taniguchi, a postman at age 16, was on his bicycle a little more than one mile away from the Nagasaki hypocenter.

    To Be Atom Bombed 2008

  • If we live in a navel-gazing culture, its epicenter may well be Washington, D.C. — and its hypocenter may be the Washington press corps.

    Media Elite Dissects Itself In D.C. : Vanity Fair Fair, Vanity 2008

  • August 6, 1945: At the hypocenter in Hiroshima, at Shima Hospital, it was worse than if a Richter-10 flaming cosmic-quake came blasting down upon them from the gods, rattling the earth's axis, scorching, searing, and radiating everything and everyone below.

    To Be Atom Bombed 2008

  • He was exposed to the A-bombing on August 6 in Nakajima Shinmachi (currently Peace Memorial Park), approximately 500 meters from the hypocenter.

    AUGUST 6, 1945 / A DAY OF INFAMY 2008

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  • (n): (Geology) - Also known as the focus, the hypocenter is the point of origin of an earthquake. It is expressed with no fewer than three measurements: latitude, longitude, and depth.

    January 23, 2009