Real‐time forecasting of the April 11, 2012 Sumatra tsunami

Wang, Dailin; Becker, Nathan; Walsh, David; Fryer, Gerard J.; Weinstein, Stuart; McCreery, Charles S.; Sardina, V.; Hsu, Vindell; Hirshorn, B. F.; Hayes, Gavin P.; Duputel, Zacharie; Rivera, Luis; Kanamori, Hiroo; Koyanagi, Kanoa; Shiro, B.

doi:10.1029/2012gl053081

Cited by 48 publications

(27 citation statements)

References 22 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…As detailed in §4b, it should be noted, however, that in the case of the large intra-oceanic event of 11 April 2012 off the coast of Sumatra, the earlier WCMT solution differed significantly from the final one, achieved 22 min later [54], the two mechanisms being rotated 51 • apart in the formalism of Kagan [55]. This difference of geometry was important in the context of tsunamigenesis, notably for the near field; however, its origin remains unclear.…”

Section: (C) the W-phasementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Even though this geological province had been recognized as the focus of very large earthquakes for close to 35 years in what was then called the 'Indo-Australian plate' [103], the 2012 earthquakes caught the scientific community by total surprise, especially on account of their exceptional sizes. Wang et al [54] provide a detailed timeline of the forecasting efforts at PTWC, where, by default, the event was modelled as a thrust fault until a definitive solution was obtained by W-phase inversion a mere 44 min after origin time and an adequate estimate of wave heights obtained 53 min later. Interestingly, the earliest W-phase CMT solution yielded a hybrid mechanism, intermediate between pure thrust and strike-slip.…”

Section: (B) Events Since 2010mentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

The quest for wisdom: lessons from 17 tsunamis, 2004–2014

Okal¹

2015

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A.

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Since the catastrophic Sumatra–Andaman tsunami took place in 2004, 16 other tsunamis have resulted in significant damage and 14 in casualties. We review the fundamental changes that have affected our command of tsunami issues as scientists, engineers and decision-makers, in the quest for improved wisdom in this respect. While several scientific paradigms have had to be altered or abandoned, new algorithms, e.g. the W seismic phase and real-time processing of fast-arriving seismic P waves, give us more powerful tools to estimate in real time the tsunamigenic character of an earthquake. We assign to each event a ‘wisdom index’ based on the warning issued (or not) during the event, and on the response of the population. While this approach is admittedly subjective, it clearly shows several robust trends: (i) we have made significant progress in our command of far-field warning, with only three casualties in the past 10 years; (ii) self-evacuation by educated populations in the near field is a key element of successful tsunami mitigation; (iii) there remains a significant cacophony between the scientific community and decision-makers in industry and government as documented during the 2010 Maule and 2011 Tohoku events; and (iv) the so-called ‘tsunami earthquakes’ generating larger tsunamis than expected from the size of their seismic source persist as a fundamental challenge, despite scientific progress towards characterizing these events in real time.

show abstract

Section: (C) the W-phasementioning

confidence: 99%

Section: (B) Events Since 2010mentioning

confidence: 99%

The quest for wisdom: lessons from 17 tsunamis, 2004–2014

Okal¹

2015

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A.

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…The recent deployment of advanced seismological analysis methods for rapid determination of earthquake source parameters, such as the W phase analysis [19], makes it possible to quickly assess an earthquake's size with acceptable accuracy and to estimate the potential tsunami size, in order to issue tsunami warnings in less than half an hour for global earthquakes. For example, during the 2012 Sumatra earthquake, PTWC issued bulletins with not only earthquake parameters but also tsunami amplitudes predicted by simulation-based empirical formula [20]. Thus tsunami warning is practically possible at least for far-field tsunamis.…”

Section: Review Of Developments In Seismologymentioning

confidence: 99%

Advances in earthquake and tsunami sciences and disaster risk reduction since the 2004 Indian ocean tsunami

Satake

2014

Geosci. Lett.

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The December 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami was the worst tsunami disaster in the world's history with more than 200,000 casualties. This disaster was attributed to giant size (magnitude M~9, source length >1000 km) of the earthquake, lacks of expectation of such an earthquake, tsunami warning system, knowledge and preparedness for tsunamis in the Indian Ocean countries. In the last ten years, seismology and tsunami sciences as well as tsunami disaster risk reduction have significantly developed. Progress in seismology includes implementation of earthquake early warning, real-time estimation of earthquake source parameters and tsunami potential, paleoseismological studies on past earthquakes and tsunamis, studies of probable maximum size, recurrence variability, and long-term forecast of large earthquakes in subduction zones. Progress in tsunami science includes accurate modeling of tsunami source such as contribution of horizontal components or "tsunami earthquakes", development of new types of offshore and deep ocean tsunami observation systems such as GPS buoys or bottom pressure gauges, deployments of DART gauges in the Pacific and other oceans, improvements in tsunami propagation modeling, and real-time inversion or data assimilation for the tsunami warning. These developments have been utilized for tsunami disaster reduction in the forms of tsunami early warning systems, tsunami hazard maps, and probabilistic tsunami hazard assessments. Some of the above scientific developments helped to reveal the source characteristics of the 2011 Tohoku earthquake, which caused devastating tsunami damage in Japan and Fukushima Dai-ichi Nuclear Power Station accident. Toward tsunami disaster risk reduction, interdisciplinary and trans-disciplinary approaches are needed for scientists with other stakeholders.

show abstract

“…Using the moment tensor with M w can facilitate more reliable tsunami forecasts (e.g., Reymond et al 2012;Gusman and Tanioka 2014). Tsunami forecast systems based on the estimated centroid moment tensor (CMT) have been installed by the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center (PTWC) (e.g., Wang et al 2012; PTWC/ ITIC 2014) and the French Polynesian Tsunami Warning Center (CPPT: Centre Polynésien de Prévention des Tsunamis) (e.g., Clément and Reymond 2015;Jamelot and Reymond 2015).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Near-field tsunami forecast system based on near real-time seismic moment tensor estimation in the regions of Indonesia, the Philippines, and Chile

et al. 2016

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

We have developed a near-field tsunami forecast system based on an automatic centroid moment tensor (CMT) estimation using regional broadband seismic observation networks in the regions of Indonesia, the Philippines, and Chile. The automatic procedure of the CMT estimation has been implemented to estimate tsunamigenic earthquakes. A tsunami propagation simulation model is used for the forecast and hindcast. A rectangular fault model based on the estimated CMT is employed to represent the initial condition of tsunami height. The forecast system considers uncertainties due to two possible fault planes and two possible scaling laws and thus shows four possible scenarios with these associated uncertainties for each estimated CMT. The system requires approximately 15 min to estimate the CMT after the occurrence of an earthquake and approximately another 15 min to make the tsunami forecast results including the maximum tsunami height and its arrival time at the epicentral region and near-field coasts available. The retrospectively forecasted tsunamis were evaluated by the deep-sea pressure and tide gauge observations, for the past eight tsunamis (M w 7.5-8.6) that occurred throughout the regional seismic networks. The forecasts ranged from half to double the amplitudes of the deep-sea pressure observations and ranged mostly within the same order of magnitude as the maximum heights of the tide gauge observations. It was found that the forecast uncertainties increased for greater earthquakes (e.g., M w > 8) because the tsunami source was no longer approximated as a point source for such earthquakes. The forecast results for the coasts nearest to the epicenter should be carefully used because the coasts often experience the highest tsunamis with the shortest arrival time (e.g., <30 min).

show abstract

Real‐time forecasting of the April 11, 2012 Sumatra tsunami

Cited by 48 publications

References 22 publications

The quest for wisdom: lessons from 17 tsunamis, 2004–2014

The quest for wisdom: lessons from 17 tsunamis, 2004–2014

Advances in earthquake and tsunami sciences and disaster risk reduction since the 2004 Indian ocean tsunami

Near-field tsunami forecast system based on near real-time seismic moment tensor estimation in the regions of Indonesia, the Philippines, and Chile

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About