Observations of Tilt Deformations in Moscow during the November 12, 2017, Earthquake at the Iran–Iraq Boundary

Doklady Earth Sciences - A residual tilt after a teleseismic earthquake is described in this work. The results of static and dynamic modeling of this event fit the measured values. The conditions...     

Evaluation of real-time flash flood forecasts for Haiti during the passage of Hurricane Tomas, November 4–6, 2010

The January 2010 earthquake that devastated Haiti left its population ever more vulnerable to rainfall-induced flash floods. A flash flood guidance system has been implemented to provide real-time information on the potential of small (~70 km²) basins for flash flooding throughout Haiti. This system has components for satellite rainfall ingest and adjustment on the basis of rain gauge information, dynamic soil water deficit estimation, ingest of operational mesoscale model quantitative precipitation forecasts, and estimation of the times of channel flow at bankfull. The result of the system integration is the estimation of the flash flood guidance (FFG) for a given basin and for a given duration. FFG is the amount of rain of a given duration over a small basin that causes minor flooding in the outlet of the basin. Amounts predicted or nowcasted that are higher than the FFG indicate basins with potential for flash flooding. In preparation for Hurricane Tomas’ landfall in early November 2010, the FFG system was used to generate 36-h forecasts of flash flood occurrence based on rainfall forecasts of the nested high-resolution North American Model of the National Centers for Environmental Prediction. Assessment of the forecast flood maps and forecast precipitation indicates the utility and value of the forecasts in understanding the spatial distribution of the expected flooding for mitigation and disaster management. It also highlights the need for explicit uncertainty characterization of forecast risk products due to large uncertainties in quantitative precipitation forecasts on hydrologic basin scales.     

Evolution of the southern Taiwan–Sinzi Folded Zone and opening of the southern Okinawa trough

Recent interpretation of seismic sections and free-air gravity anomalies in offshore northern Taiwan reveals that the southern Taiwan–Sinzi Folded Zone began to form in late Middle Miocene, though it was mainly constructed in the Late Pliocene with strong reverse faulting and folding. Two westward progradational sequences were deposited in the shelf basin with sediments supplied from the southern Taiwan–Sinzi Folded Zone and the southern Ryukyu Arc. These two structures are displaced by several northwest-striking dextral strike–slip faults that were active in the early Quaternary when the clockwise-rotated southern Ryukyu Arc and the folded southern Taiwan–Sinzi Folded Zone were broken. It is believed that recent extension in the southern Okinawa Trough started in the early Quaternary because uplift on the southern Taiwan–Sinzi Folded Zone continued to latest Pliocene–early Quaternary. Paleogene–Miocene sediments of the East China Sea Shelf in the western part of the southern Okinawa Trough Basin are interpreted to indicate that the East China Sea Shelf Basin extended to the east of the southern Taiwan–Sinzi Folded Zone.