The Summer of Tsunami by S. Campbell Williams

This seismicity is documented to have reached considerable hazard levels, with Ambraseys & Melville ( 1982) listing 36 events (most of them not tsunamigenic) of estimated M > 6, of which 11 have M > 7. The focal mechanism is the CMT solution for the 20 June, 1990 Rudbar earthquake. Red circles are epicentres of earthquakes (1900–2014) from the EHB catalogue.

Seismicity of the northern Iranian plateau and the Caspian Sea region. 2010), and northern margins of the Sea (e.g. 2002 Aghanabati 2004), and the slopes on the western margin such as the Derbent basin (e.g. 2002), the faulting systems in the northern Iranian plateau, extending to the southern coast of the Caspian Sea (e.g.

1999), seismic sources with the potential of generating tsunamis in the Caspian Sea include the Apsheron-Balkan belt at the northern boundary of the southern Caspian basin (e.g. In the general seismotectonic framework of the region (e.g. Tsunami hazard in the southern Caspian Sea stems principally from the high level of seismicity of the Iranian plateau and in particular its northern region closest to the southern margins of the Sea (Fig. Epicentres for historical events reported by Ambraseys & Melville ( 1982) are depicted with blue triangles. Earthquake epicentres for M S > 6.0 from the USGS catalogue (1900–2014) are shown with green circles. Historical tsunami sources surrounding the southern Caspian Sea (red circles) (Ambraseys & Melville 1982). We suggest that the occurrence of such underwater landslides should become a primary ingredient to the assessment of tsunami risk along the Southern shores of the Caspian Sea. Rather, we show that the model of an underwater landslide, presumably triggered by the earthquake, and taking place on the steep slopes of the continental shelf approximately 10 km offshore, can fit the principal inundation characteristics identified during the survey.

A hydrodynamic simulation using the earthquake dislocation as the source of the tsunami fails to reproduce both the amplitude of the waves, and especially their concentration between the cities of Kiashahr and Jafrood. We present the results of a field survey, documenting the concentration of the effects of the tsunami along a section of coastline not exceeding 30 km in length. The Rudbar-Tarom earthquake of 1990 June 20 ( M 0 = 1.4 × 10 27 dyn cm), the largest one in Iran over the past 35 yr, was accompanied by a small tsunami in the Caspian Sea, which produced run-ups of up to 2 m, and inundations of 1 km, reaffirming the existence of tsunami hazard along the Caspian shoreline, as suggested by historical reports.

The Summer of Tsunami by S. Campbell Williams