Attenuation of Ground-Motion Spectral Amplitudes in Southeastern Australia

Allen, T. I. and Cummins, P. R. and Dhu, T. and Schneider, J. F. (2007) Attenuation of Ground-Motion Spectral Amplitudes in Southeastern Australia. Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America, 97 (4). pp. 1279-1292. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1785/0120060172

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Official URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1785/0120060172

Abstract

A dataset comprising some 1200 weak- and strong-motion records from 84 earthquakes is compiled to develop a regional ground-motion model for south- eastern Australia (SEA). Events were recorded from 1993 to 2004 and range in size from moment magnitude 2.0 <= M <= 4.7. The decay of vertical-component Fourier spectral amplitudes is modeled by trilinear geometrical spreading. The decay of low- frequency spectral amplitudes can be approximated by the coefficient of R^(-1.3) (where R is hypocentral distance) within 90 km of the seismic source. From approximately 90 to 160 km, we observe a transition zone in which the seismic coda are affected by postcritical reflections from midcrustal and Moho discontinuities. In this hypo- central distance range, geometrical spreading is approximately R^0.1. Beyond 160 km, low-frequency seismic energy attenuates rapidly with source–receiver distance, having a geometrical spreading coefficient of R^(-1.6). The associated regional seismic-quality factor can be expressed by the polynomial: log Q(f) = 3.66 - 1.44 log f + 0.768 (log f)^2 + 0.058 (log f)^3 for frequencies 0.78 <= f <= 19.9 Hz. Fourier spectral amplitudes, corrected for geometrical spreading and anelastic attenuation, are regressed with M to obtain quadratic source scaling coefficients. Modeled vertical-component displacement spectra fit the observed data well. Amplitude residuals are, on average, relatively small and do not vary with hypocentral distance. Predicted source spectra (i.e., at R = 1 km) are consistent with eastern North American (ENA) models at low frequencies (f less than approximately 2 Hz) indicating that moment magnitudes calculated for SEA earthquakes are consistent with moment magnitude scales used in ENA over the observed magnitude range. The models presented represent the first spectral ground-motion prediction equations developed for the southeastern Australian region. This work provides a useful framework for the development of regional ground-motion relations for earthquake hazard and risk assessment in SEA.

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Item Type: Article
Subjects: Methodology > Method and procesing > Probabilistic seismic hazard analysis - stationary > Path and site effects
Project: IS-EPOS project