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Determination of maximum earthquake magnitude
Author(s) -
Smith Stewart W.
Publication year - 1976
Publication title -
geophysical research letters
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.007
H-Index - 273
eISSN - 1944-8007
pISSN - 0094-8276
DOI - 10.1029/gl003i006p00351
Subject(s) - magnitude (astronomy) , geology , seismology , earthquake magnitude , moment magnitude scale , fault (geology) , seismic gap , maximum magnitude , slip (aerodynamics) , earthquake prediction , holocene , seismic moment , earthquake simulation , displacement (psychology) , geodesy , active fault , seismic hazard , geometry , engineering , mathematics , psychology , paleontology , physics , astronomy , aerospace engineering , scaling , psychotherapist
A method is proposed to utilize the geologic record of fault displacement along with fault length to estimate the maximum magnitude earthquake that can be expected on an active fault. The method uses seismic moment as the link between geologic data and earthquake statistics. Several examples illustrate that faults of comparable length but different total slip in Holocene time have significantly different earthquake potentials.