The IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency) will organize a webinar on May 30, dealing with recent advances in probabilistic fault displacement hazard assessment for nuclear installations in light of geological reconnaissance findings.
The webinar will provide an overview of the contribution of collected field evidence for principal and distributed ruptures; present the geological reconnaissance survey findings for the 6 February 2023, Turkiye earthquake sequence; provide information on IAEA activities regarding PFDHA including results of a benchmarking study.
We are pleased to announce a kick-off meeting of the Thematic Lab on Fault Displacement Hazard, to be held on Wed. 14th June 2023; 17:00 – 18:30 CET (15-16:30 UTC; 12-13:30 ART; 8-9:30 PST)
This first meeting will:
Introduce the aims of the Lab;
Give the opportunity to all the participants to introduce themselves, share thoughts and expectations, share ideas of potential common interest – if you have an idea that needs to be explained with a figure, feel free to prepare one slide;
Planning future actions: all the ideas from the community are welcome! For the moment, we think short talk series can be a good way to start interactions for possible collaborations, e.g., 2 talks per meeting on stimulating topics, with large space for discussion. We are planning to have the first of the talk series in September 2023.
If you have a topic, or results from your research or experiences that can help the discussion and interactions, please propose your talk at the meeting.
If you know a colleague working on topics of potential interest for FDH, who does not know about the Lab, please invite her/him to join the Lab, or simply invite her/him to have a talk during a future meeting.
Please, confirm your attendance to the kick-off meeting by sending an e-mail to Francesca (francesca.ferrario@uninsubria.it), so we will share with you the link to attend the meeting.
The deadline to submit your application for MSCA-DN TREAD project PhD positions has been postponed. The new deadline is 30th of April. The topics range from fault mechanics and structural geology, to machine learning seismicity monitoring and modelling, to dynamic rupture modelling, seismic hazard and risk estimation, and much more. Visit https://tread-horizon.eu and submit your application. A new generation of earthquake researchers is waiting for you!
In the wake of the devasting 6th of February 2023 earthquake that hit a very wide region along the Turkey/Syria border, the members of the European Seismological Commission Fault2sha Working group wish to express their support to the families of the victims and all those doing their utmost today to continue to rescue and help the affected population. In silence, in the backstage, we continue our activities to improve knowledge and create synergies in the hope that tomorrow we shall never again witness similar catastrophes.
To appreciate some of our actions, we encourage you to visit the two new thematic labs created following the 6th Fault2SHA Workshop in Chieti:
Fault2SHA Post-earthquake Reconnaissance Lab; many new Fault2sha members have joined this laboratory, motivated by the occurrence of the recent earthquake in Turkey. Each one ready to help in presence or remotely.
We also encourage you to visit our JOB OFFERS announcing the call for 11 PhD positions, in the Marie Sklodowska-Curie Doctoral Network of the Project TREAD. The selection will be carried out in various European institutions. We hope young people from the devastated areas can participate to the selection too, to build together a new generation of Fault2SHA scientists.
We are ready for the 6th Workshop of the Fault2SHA ESC Working Group. It will be held in Chieti on January 19-20, 2023. It is the first in-person meeting after years; it follows the kickoff meeting of the new Horizon Europe MSCA-DN project TREAD, leaded by the University of Chieti-Pescara. TREAD will open 11 phD positions in Europe soon.
About 45 experienced and early career researchers are expected; key-note lectures will be recorded for the community. Enjoy the PRE-WORKSHOP PROCEEDINGS, and the mountains’ view!
A new Horizon Europe MSCA-DN project has been funded by the European Commision.
Project Title: TREAD, data and pRocesses in sEismic hAzarD
Project Coordinator: Bruno Pace (Università Chieti-Pescara, Italy)
The aim of TREAD is to train a new generation of researchers to tackle the challenges of earthquake forecasting in complex tectonic settings using integrated observations and physics.
The TREAD objectives are:
(i) to develop a novel integrative approach to seismic hazard analysis in Europe and the Mediterranean from small-scale laboratory experiments to large-scale observations.
(ii) to establish physics-based earthquake modelling bridging time scales from millions of years to fractions of a second in complex tectonic settings.
(iii) to improve the link between earthquake geology, computational modelling and hazard and risk assessment with a focus on the needs of governments, industry and scientific stakeholders.
To reach these objectives the TREAD consortium comprises 14 academic and 8 non-academic institutions, of which 8 private partners, of high scientific level, from 7 European countries, covering cutting-edge knowledge and expertise in observational, experimental and modelling fields:
Università degli Studi di Chieti-Pescara (Ud’A), Italy
Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), France
Universiteit Utrecht (UU), Netherlands
Fondazione GEM (GEM), Italy
Université Grenoble-Alpes (UGA), France
Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München (LMU), Germany
Universitat de Barcelona (UB), Spain
Università degli Studi di Padova (UNIPD), Italy
Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH), Switzerland
Institut de Sureté Nucléaire et de Radioprotection (IRSN), France
Istituto Nazionale di Oceanografia e Geofisica Sperimentale (OGS), Italy
Istituto Nazionale di Geofisica e Vulcanologia (INGV), Italy
Ruhr University Bochum (RUB), Germany
Institut de Physique du Globe (IPGP), France
Helmholtz Institute Freiberg for Resource Technology (HZDR), Germany
Willis Tower Watson (Willis), United Kingdom
IFP Energies Nouvelles (IFPEN), France
Eléctricité de France (EDF), France
Università degli studi di Milano Bicocca (UNIMIB), Italy
Munich REb (MUNCHRE), Germany
TNO (TNO), Netherlands
TRE-Altamira (TRE), Italy
Aix-Marseille Université (AMU), France
11 PhD positions will be available soon: HERE the details.
A new coordinated project, composed by three subprojects led by fault2sha members of the Eastern Betics fautl2SHA-lab has been funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation (PID2021-124155NB-C31).
Project Title: SHaKER, Seismic Hazard Knowledge for Earthquake Resilience
IPs: José A. Álvarez Gómez, José J. Martínez Díaz (UCM, subproject model_SHaKER), Carolina Canora (UAM, subproject paleo_SHaKER) and Alejandra Staller (UPM, subproject Geo_SHaKER)
The main objective of the SHaKER project is to advance in the knowledge of the seismogenic processes of seismic sources with the final objective of improving urban resilience to seismic disasters. To achieve this, we delve into the characterization of seismogenic source models with the integration and correlation of a number of disciplines in an interdisciplinar and multidisciplinar approach. To characterize the seismic sources we will use geological, geochemical, geotechnical, geodetic and geophysical data in addition to the development of numerical modelling and data analyses through machine-learning techniques. The numerical modelling will allow us to get insight into the complex, nonlinear, relations between the faults of the system, but also including external geological processes and tectonics in the long term evolution of fault systems.
These seismic source models are the basis for the development of new seismic and tsunami hazard and risk assessment studies, whose results will be essential to establish new proposals for improving urban resilience. The SHaKER project will help to estimate the faults seismic cycle and transient behaviours and characterize those seismogenic sources, including their kinematics and mechanical properties. These data will help us to quantitatively assess the sensitivity to uncertainties, thus contributing to reach the UN SDG11 in terms of the improved assessment of seismic risk, making the cities more inclusive, safe, resilient, and sustainable. In concordance with this aim we will develop also better assessments of earthquake triggered slope instabilities, earthquake surface ruptures and liquefaction.
We will continue the studies carried out in previous projects in two seismically active and densely populated zones, with different tectonic behaviours and transcurrent faults of special interest: the Eastern Betic Shear Zone (EBSZ) and the El Salvador Fault Zone (ESFZ). The EBSZ is one of the areas with the highest seismicity in the Iberian Peninsula where the largest populations (Lorca, Totana, Alhama de Murcia) are located directly above the fault traces. The need for a detailed study of the behaviour and geological history of these faults became evident after the 2011 Lorca earthquake, moderate magnitude event that caused important damage. The ESFZ is a system of strike-slip faults with significant seismic activity and a medium to high deformation rate, aligned within the volcanic arc, where a large part of the country’s population is concentrated. In this case, we will try to improve the knowledge of the ESFZ in the less studied areas, expanding our study to the Nicaraguan and Guatemalan volcanic arcs (including the Jalpatagua fault).
The SHaKER project will be backed by a multidisciplinary research team made up of geologists, geochemists, geophysicists, mathematicians, civil engineers and geomatics engineers. This guarantees the integration and correlation of diverse data sources, as well as the establishment of different approaches to assess the seismic hazard and its relationship and influence on the seismic risk and future urban planning. The results of the project will help to reinforce the resilience of cities in terms of seismic risk, generating products and tools that will be useful for public institutions and decision-makers, who work in emergency planning before de disaster.
