Ara,

Let's see what I can do here:

You wrote, �g�cvarious types of sounds, but larger quakes make a huge sound and it is much like imagining an electric wire that has a huge amount of electricity attached to it and its sound is bushy or sparking with electricity�h

I take this to mean a crackling sound.

No. Sometimes there are no good words to place with certain things and ear tones are one of those that words don't always match what you are trying to convey. Its just an expansion of the normal sound, only much louder and seeming to have more of an electrical bigger/wider sound.

As a visual lets say that the wire the normal regular old every day ear tone is heard from is thin. Imagine if you have a very large earthquake you'd need a wire that is an inch around.

�gTo give a sound reference, the Nisqually sound was the equivalent of standing on a train station next to the track with a freight train passing going 60 or more miles per hour.�h

This would be a sort of rhythmic roar?

No. Just hugely loud, constant, no dips, no fades, just coming at you.

Do you ever hear sounds that are simply of one frequency, either a single musical pitch, or a simple rhythmic clicking sound?

Yes,I hear many ear tones that are a single pitch, but I've never heard a clicking sound.

�gThe sound I had never heard before was the ending sound of the Nisqually quake. I could hear the p-waves spreading out.�h

I assume you were hearing something prior to the quake, so I do not know what you mean by saying you �gcould hear the p-waves�h.

Sorry, bad choice of words. The sequence was that I heard the larger than life sound ear tone and then after the normal ear tone ceased immediately I heard a sound that seemed as though the sound itself was spreading in a circle going away from the central point where the initial sound came from.

I'm sure you probably know this, but many people may not. Ear tone mimic the location of where earthquakes come from. Every fault has its own unique sound and if you study where these sounds come from its a no brainer to understand why you heard what you did. The sound and the location match.

Lets make this really easy:
Very high pitched sounds come from granite or hard rocks. (The Sierra's)
Lower pitched sounds come from areas which have more dirt around the rocks. (The SAF at Parkfield)
Unclear or muffled sounds come from the ocean. (San Simeon)

You had better know your geology to find the match to the sound and your seismology to know what kinds of earthquakes are normal to that area. The Sierras can deliver a sound that is very loud, but only a small quake arrives, so its tricky.

We have to understand that none of us can ever hear what another person hears. It can be similar, but it is not the same. To that we should give some latitude to everyone because we too are uniquely individual.

Petra