In a few quick shots of Spider-Man 3, we can see newspaper clips about sudden earthquakes being felt within the subway system
The New York subways extend all the way throughout the city, so Sandman is implied to be creating city wide earthquakes
New York city is an area of 302.6 sq miles, with that being a circular radius of 15.7946 kilometers
Checking the Mercalli scale and Richter scale, the effects best line up with a magnitude 3-4
I'll use 3 as the low end, 3.5 as the mid end, and 4 as the high end
- (Magnitude at distance) + 0.0238*r = Richter Magnitude of Earthquake
- (3) + 0.0238*15.7946 = magnitude 3.3759
- (3.5) + 0.0238*15.7946 = magnitude 3.8759
- (4) + 0.0238*15.7946 = magnitude 4.3759
- Low end: 10^(1.5*3.3759+4.8) = 7308866010 joules or 1.7 tons of tnt
- Mid end: 10^(1.5*3.8759+4.8) = 41100773954.2 joules or 9.8 tons of tnt
- High end: 10^(1.5*4.3759+4.8) = 231126636918 joules or 55 tons of tnt
Revision[]
- KLOL suggested: "And it was throughout the Subway Systems, not all of New York, so the area affected would be a lot smaller even if you included all the other boroughs"
- I'll just use google maps and pull out the longest diameters
- According to Google maps, the biggest distance between two ends of the subway system is 38.35 km at it's longest, to 19.97 km at it's widest
Only the low end and mid end were accepted by Mr. Bambu, so I'll just stick with those
- Low Low end: (3) + 0.0238*(19.97/2) = mag 3.238
- Low Mid end: (3.5) + 0.0238*(19.97/2) = mag 3.738
- High Low end: (3) + 0.0238*(38.35/2) = mag 3.456
- High Mid end: (3.5) + 0.0238*(38.35/2) = mag 3.956
Using the 19.97 km widths was accepted
- Low Low end energy: 10^(1.5*3.238+4.8) = 4539416170 joules or 1.08 tons of tnt
- Low High end energy: 10^(1.5*3.738+4.8) = 25527013000 joules or 6.1 tons of tnt
- High Low end energy:
10^(1.5*3.456+4.8) = 9638290240 joules or 2.3 tons of tnt - High High end energy:
10^(1.5*3.956+4.8) = 54200089000 joules or 13 tons of tnt