Faulty Assumptions Impair Earthquake Hazard Assessment in Italy

Faulty Assumptions Impair Earthquake Hazard Assessment in Italy

New publication!

It has finally published on Tectonophysics a new paper published with collegues of University of Pavia and University of Trieste.
The paper is entitled "The effects of pre-existing discontinuities on the surface expression of normal faults: Insights from wet-clay analogue modeling" and explore how the presence of pre-existing discontinuities, either structural or sedimentary, can influence the growth of a normal fault and what can be their surface expression at the different evolutionary stages.

You can find the paper at the following address on the journal webpage:

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0040195115006782

This is the graphical abstract of the paper (taken from the journal webpage)













Highlights

• We use wet-clay analog models to simulate isolated initially-blind normal faults.
• We analyze the interaction of surface normal faults with inherited discontinuities.
• Inherited discontinuities strongly affect fault development at the Earth's surface.
• The influence of a discontinuity strongly depends on its orientation relative to the fault.
• We provide a ranking chart to assess fault-to-discontinuity interactions.

INGVterremoti

Here are the links to the posts written for the INGVterremoti blog (in Italian), regarding large earthquakes occurring in the world:

Terremoto M 6.3 nello Stretto di Gibilterra (M 6.3 - Strait of Gibraltar - 2016-01-25 04:22:02 UTC);
for additional information see che EMSC-CSEM web page dedicated to the event.

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Recent publications on Earth Prints

My last two publications are available for download on Earth Prints that is an open archive created and maintained by Istituto Nazionale di Geofisica e Vulcanologia - INGV.

The Earth Prints web page is the following: http://www.earth-prints.org/

Here are the links for the articles:

• Ferranti, L., P. Burrato, F. Pepe, E. Santoro, M.E. Mazzella, D. Morelli, S. Passaro, G. Vannucci (2014). An active oblique-contractional belt at the transition between Southern Apennines and Calabrian Arc: the Amendolara Ridge. Tectonics, 33, doi:10.1002/2014TC003624.

Also available from http://hdl.handle.net/2122/9173 (accepted and published manuscript - the latter only for authorized users)

• Vannoli, P., P. Burrato, G. Valensise (2014). The seismotectonics of the Po Plain (Northern Italy): tectonic diversity in a blind faulting domain. Pure and Applied Geophysics, doi:10.1007/s00024-014-0873-0.

Also available from http://hdl.handle.net/2122/9058 (accepted manuscript)

If you want the printed version of the articles, just let me know emailing the request (pierfrancesco.burrato at ingv.it)

Blog INGV Terremoti

An article on the blog  "INGV Terremoti" describes our recent scientific paper on blind faulting in the Po Plain.

Blog INGV Terremoti

Vannoli, P., P. Burrato, G. Valensise (2014). The seismotectonics of the Po Plain (Northern Italy): tectonic diversity in a blind faulting domain. Pure and Applied Geophysics, doi:10.1007/s00024-014-0873-0.

GSA Meeting 2014 - Vancouver B.C.

The 2014 GSA Meeting will be held in Vancouver, B.C. (Canada).

I will give two presentations:

Seno, S., L. Bonini, R. Basili, G. Toscani, P. Burrato, G. Valensise. Interactions between growing extensional faults and pre-existing discontinuities: implications on surface effects and seismic hazard studies.

Session 2 “T1. The Structure of Faults from Top to Bottom: Implication for Fluid Flow, Ore Deposits, and Seismic Hazard I”. Sunday, 19 October 2014, in the Vancouver Convention Center-West, 118. This session begins at 8:00 AM.

Presentation Time: 9:05 AM

Ferranti, L., P. Burrato, L. Guzzetta, F. Pepe, G. Barreca, M. Mattia, C. Monaco, V. Bruno. Active thrusting in SW Sicily (Italy): hunting for seismogenic sources using a multidisciplinary approach.

Session 242 “T38. Geology of Earthquakes, Faults, and Fault Systems”. Tuesday, 21 October 2014, in the Vancouver Convention Center-West, 208/209. This session begins at 1:00 PM.

Presentation Time: 2:45 PM

GSA Meeting home page

Great ShakeOut Drill 2014

Today October 16* at 10:16 AM official ShakeOut B.C. Day, also at Montecito Elementary School (Burnaby, B.C.) like all over the world!

DROP!  COVER!  HOLD ON!

Useful links

Great ShakeOut organization

Great ShakeOut - British Columbia

Great ShakeOut - Italy

Two articles accepted!

Two recently accepted papers:

Ferranti, L., P. Burrato, F. Pepe, E. Santoro, M.E. Mazzella, D. Morelli, S. Passaro, G. Vannucci (2014). An active oblique-contractional belt at the transition between the Southern Apennines and Calabrian Arc: the Amendolara Ridge, Ionian Sea, Italy. Tectonics, doi:10.1002/2014TC003624.
Tectonics web page

Seismotectonic map of the Amendolara Ridge showing thrust segments used in the dislocation modeling (solid boxes: segment; dashed box: relay ramp; red from this study, navy from Santoro et al. [2009]), epicenters of historical events (1917 event, and 1988 earthquake mainshock and aftershocks), and the trend of strain axis (average seismological Shmax axis from Presti et al [2013]; individual seismological P-axis from Figure 11 and Table S1; shortening axis derived from fault-slip inversion from Ferranti et al. [2009]). The Sparker lines used for elastic modeling (Figure S2) are indicated. Location of the active fault scarp detected from SCS profiles is shown. AS, Amendolara Segment; CS, Cariati Segment; RR, Rossano Relay; VS, Valsinni Segment; PS, Pollino Segment; VCS, Valsinni Coastal Segment.

Vannoli, P., P. Burrato, G. Valensise (2014). The seismotectonics of the Po Plain (Northern Italy): tectonic diversity in a blind faulting domain. Pure and Applied Geophysics, doi:10.1007/s00024-014-0873-0.
Pure and Applied Geophysics web page

Sketch showing the four groups of seismogenic sources identified in this work. Group #1: shallow thrusts of the Northern Apennines, including the sub-emergent Pedeapenninic Thrust Front; Group #2: deep ramps of the Apennines thrusts; Group #3: inherited faults cutting the foreland; Group #4: transverse structures (or lineaments), interpreted as the response of the upper lithosphere to the variation of the dip of the regional monocline. EA Emilia Arc, FRA Ferrara-Romagna Arc, PTF Pedeapenninic Thrust Front.

New article submitted!

We just submitted a paper entitled “The seismotectonics of the Po Plain (northern Italy): tectonic diversity in a blind faulting domain” by Paola Vannoli, Pierfrancesco Burrato and Gianluca Valensise, for publication on Pure and Applied Geophysics.

This paper is partly a review and partly the result of original research on the identification of seismogenic sources in the Po Plain, Northern Italy, and on the role played by the paleogeography in controlling the geometry and style of the active faults systems. These are mostly blind, i.e. buried beneath the thick sedimentary cover of the Po basin, and hence very elusive, yet they pose a significant seismic hazard as testified by the recent 2012 Emilia-Romagna earthquake sequence. In this work we reorganized and presented in an orderly scheme the established knowledge on the blind shallow thrusts such as those responsible for the 2012 earthquakes, but we also shed light on two new potential categories of seismogenic sources. We show that a significant contribution to Po Plain seismic activity, end hence to the local seismic hazard, comes from reactivated inherited faults and from transverse structures that developed within the compressional wedges.

Mt Sinabung (Sumatra) eruption

Dramatic footage of rare volcanic lightning as Mt Sinabung (Sumatra) spews river of fire (from http://www.telegraph.co.uk)

Pictures of the Milazzo_2013 scientific cruise

You can see some pictures taken during the Milazzo_2013 scientific cruise just published in the "Pictures" section of this blog.

"Milazzo 2003" Cruise, January 2014..

On board of the R/V Urania

From 3 to 10 January 2014 I will be on board of the R/V Urania to explore the offshore area located between the northern Sicilian coastal city of Milazzo and Vulcano, the southernmost of the Aeolian Islands. We sailed from the harbour of Napoli, and the scientific party is leaded by the C.N.R. scientist Salvatore Passaro. Besides the researchers of the C.N.R., other scientists and students making the party are from the Universities of Trieste, Napoli and Palermo.
The target of the study is the offshore portion of a fault system known on-land as the Tindari-Letojanni system, and probably connecting with the Southern Tyrrhenian compressional belt located west of the Aeolian Island archipelago. This fault system was responsible of the Mw 6.1 15 April 1978, Golfo di Patti earthquake, that was characterized by a right-lateral trascurrent faulting mechanism.

The Party Cheaf of the scientific cruise: Sasà Passaro

Click here to see the study area of the Milazzo 2013 Cruise.



New article submitted!

Today is Christmas and I wish to all a peaceful 2014!

Notwithstanding the winter break we finally submitted to the AGU journal Tectonics a paper describing the results of a scientific cruise aboard of the research vessel Urania that was held in January 2011 in the offshore of the Jonian coast of Calabria, southern Italy.
This paper describes geological and geophysical evidence of the activity of a transpressional fault zone connected with the submerged Amendolara Ridge.

This is the abstract of the paper:
"High-resolution, single-channel seismic (sparker) profiles and multibeam bathymetry data collected in the Amendolara Ridge, the submarine extension of the Apennines thrust belt underneath the Ionian Sea, provide evidence of recent deformation in a supposedly stable crustal sector. New data show that Middle-Late Pleistocene sediments are involved in growth folds related to blind or near surface transpressional faults (Amendolara Fault System, AFS) located on the southwest flank of the ridge. Results from the new acquisition are consistent with analysis of existing multichannel seismic profiles calibrated with oil-exploratory wells. Morpho-bathymetry and seismic data indicate that distinct, ~10 to 20 km long banks which top the ~80 km long ridge are structural culminations above en-echelon fault segments. Numeric modeling of the bathymetry and of stratigraphic markers suggests that two steep (45° dip) upper crustal (2-10 km) blind fault segments underlie the ridge. The AFS spatially coincides with a belt of Mw<4.7 strike-slip and thrust earthquakes, which indicate left-oblique reverse motion. Elastic modeling of fault segments indicates they may be capable of moderate (M~6.1-6.4) earthquakes, although un unknown part of aseismic slip likely contributes to deformation. Late Pliocene-Quaternary growth of the Amendolara Ridge temporally coincides with cessation of thin-skinned Apennines thrust belt motion, when oblique collision between the Calabrian Arc and the Apulian continental crust overwhelmed subduction retreat of the Adriatic slab. Localization of the transpressional belt was controlled by an inherited mechanical interface between the thick Apulian crust and the attenuated Ionian basin."

Morphobathymetric map of the northern Jonian coast of Calabria, from Rebesco et al. (2009), Int. J. Earth Sci. (Geol. Rundsch.), 98, 791–805, doi:10.1007/s00531-009-0429-1.

The study area of the Teatioca 2011 Cruise

Here are some pictures from my Panoramio space:
The R/V Urania
Chirp bathymetry of the Amendolara Ridge
Aeolian Islands

Picture taken during the AGU 2004 Fall Meeting.....Creationism: past, present and also Future??

Flying to Amsterdam, September 2013.

Flying to Amsterdam, a view of the Po Plain. The winging silver string is the Po River (September 2013).

 

The Matterhorn (4478 m a.s.l.), Monte Cervino in Italian, as seen flying from Rome to Amsterdam in September 2013.