Posts in the category »   «  ( 16 Posts )

After the very successful 1st Workshop on Earthquake Archaeology and Paleoseismology held in the ancient roman site of Baelo Claudia (Spain, 2009), the INQUA Focus Group on Paleoseismology and Active Tectonics decided to elaborate a bi-annual calendar to support this joint initiative with the IGCP-567 “Earthquake Archaeology”. This second joint meeting moved to the eastern Mediterranean, a tectonically active setting within the Africa-Eurasia collision zone and located in the origins of the pioneer’s works on archaeoseismology. However, for the coming year 2012, at least a part of us will move also to the New World, where the 3rd INQUA-IGCP 567 international workshop will take place in Morelia, Mexico in November 2012. It is planned to proceed with the meeting, so we are thinking of Aachen, Germany, to be the host in 2013, possibly together with Louvain, Belgium.

more

It is our greatest pleasure to announce that a new special issue on paleo- and archaeoseismology has been published. The special issue of Quaternary International mainly consists of contributions from a selection of those presented during the first International Workshop on Earthquake Archaeology and Palaeoseismology held at the ancient Roman City of Baelo Claudia (South Spain) in September 2009. There in Southern Spain, the first joint meeting of the INQUA Focus Area on Palaeoseismology and Active tectonics and the UNESCO-IUGS programme IGCP567 on Earthquake Archaeology took place. This volume is one of the first accounts of an integrated approach in the study of past earthquakes combining recent advances in palaeoseismology and earthquake archaeology.

There’s a lot of great reading stuff or the summer holidays or on the plane to Corinth… more

This week’s centerfault is a very prominent one that you will know for sure – the Dead Sea Fault. The sinistral strike-slip fault marks the boundary between the Arabian plate and the Sinai. The entire system is more than 600 km long and has accommodated ~107 km of slip since Miocene. Magnitude 7 is no problem for this structure and the recurrence intervalls are short. more

Dear colleagues and friends,

the registration for the Corinth2011 workshop is open again. Due to additional capacities at the conference venue we can offer 20 more places! You can register via the paleoseismicity.org website. However, the abstract submission is closed. Don’t hesitate to contact us if you have any questions.

Have a nice weekend and looking forward to seeing you in Corinth,

The Organization Committee

This day’s Centerfault is the Sparta Fault in southern Greece (37.1°N 23.3°E). Being situated on the Peloponessus, the fault marks one of the most prominent geomorphological features of the peninsula. It is famous for the historical 464 BC earthquake that destroyed ancient Sparta. However,  the days of Spartian glory ended much later after a severe military defeat in the battle of Leuctra in 371 BC, Sparta never fully recovered. more

Now the EGU2011 in Vienna is over. Thousands of scientists have attended the meeting and more than 13,000 abstratcs were presented. Approx. 20,000 portions of Gulasz and 100,000 Wiener Schnitzels were served, hektoliters of wine and beer went down the throats of thirsty scientists. Some people say the EGU contributes with 10% to the income of Vienna’s bartenders. Several contributions dealt with paleoseismology, paleoseismicity, archeoseismology and paleotsunamis especially on Monday and Friday. more

The L’Aquila earthquake from 6 April, 2009 caused more than 308 fatalities and destroyed about 15,000 buildings. A new initiative set up by the British architect Barnaby Gunning aims on creating a 3D model of the destroyed city in its present state with SketchUp for GoogleEarth. The model will be used for “creating a valuable resourcef for masterplanning the reconstruction”, Gunning states on the project’s homepage. more

Dear Researchers and Other Interested Parties!

We invite you to submit an abstract to the special session “Archeoseismology: Learning about Ancient Earthquakes from the Archeological Record” of the Seismological Society of America Annual meeting to be held in Memphis, TN, April 13-15th. This is a reminder that the abstract deadline for the 2011 SSA annual meeting is 5 PM PST on 11 January.

more

The online science magazine “spektrumdirekt” reports on the archeoseismological and paleoseismological studies in Baelo Claudia, Southern Spain. The article focusses on tsunami hazard in the Mediterranean region and the two earthquakes that devastated the Roman town of Baelo Claudia hundreds of years ago. more

Paleoseismology and archeoseismology do only rarely appear in the curriculae of geoscience studies. Those topics will be covered in courses on tectonics and structural geology in most universities. Practical courses that allow applying the knowledge in the field can be a very good supplement, but in Germany, active faults are rare. RWTH Aachen University therefore organized a field trip to Greece, where active faults, fault scarps, archeological sites and beautiful outcrops are omnipresent.

more