Rediversion salinity change in the Cooper River,South Carolina: Ecological implications

A 70% reduction in freshwater discharge through the Cooper River Basin, South Carolina, has provided a unique opportunity to study changes in estuarine plant communities in response to a system-wide increase in salinity. A one-dimensional tidal prism mixing model was used to simulate the changes in the longitudinal salinity distribution which have occurred in the Cooper River since a diversion in 1985 reduced the mean flow from 442 to 130 m³ s^?1. Model simulations indicate that a salinity increase of 10–14‰ has occurred in the region of the river where the marsh plant community shifts from a virtual monoculture ofSpartina alterniflora to a more diverse brackish community. The flow reduction and associated salinity increase are expected to result in an increased dominance of the halophyte,S. alterniflora, and a progressive exclusion of the less halotolerant species which currently inhabit this region.     

Characteristics of three recent earthquake sequences in the Taupo Volcanic Zone, New Zealand

We have analysed three recent earthquake sequences in the northern part of the Taupo Volcanic Zone. A 1998 sequence at Haroharo with a largest event of M_L 4.8, and a 2004 sequence near Lake Rotoehu (largest event M_L 5.4), had normal b-values, and displayed an aftershock decay pattern, with most of the activity within the first few days. In contrast, a 2005 sequence a few tens of kilometres away at Matata (largest event M_L 4.1), had very different characteristics, with a slow development and decay, no tendency for enhanced seismicity after the larger events, and a very high b-value.The focal mechanisms of the Rotoehu and Matata events are normal, and have stress patterns consistent with the geodetically observed extension of the Taupo Volcanic Zone in a northwest–southeast direction. The extensive recent volcanism in the Okataina Volcanic Centre does not seem to have affected the stress pattern in this area.The Rotoehu sequence showed a strong resemblance, particularly in the time distribution of events, to the well-known swarm activity in the Vogtland region on the German/Czech border, in which larger events were followed by a burst of seismicity, as in a normal aftershock sequence. Some of the arguments that have been advanced to explain the Vogtland swarm as seismicity induced by fluid injection apply to Rotoehu, but there is no direct evidence of fluid involvement. The Matata sequence appears to have a continuing trigger mechanism, either a slow injection of fluid, or a slow slip event, in an environment in which opening pore spaces prevent high overpressures developing. The Matata sequence occurred close to the area of the 1987 M_L 6.3 Edgecumbe Earthquake, so exhibiting two extremes of seismic temporal pattern, namely mainshock–aftershock and a swarm with many events of similar magnitude, within a small area.     

Evaluation of a numerical model of the British–Irish ice sheet using relative sea‐level data: implications for the interpretation of trimline observations

The glacial isostatic adjustment (GIA) of the British Isles is complex due to the interplay between local and non‐local signals. A number of recent studies have modelled the GIA response of the British Isles using relative sea‐level data. This study extends these previous analyses by using output from a numerical glaciological model as input to a GIA model. This is a necessary step towards more realistic GIA models, and although there have been similar studies for the major late Pleistocene ice sheets, this is the first study to do so for the British Isles. We test three reconstructions, classed as ‘minimal’, ‘median’ and ‘maximal’ in terms of their volume at maximum extent, and find it is possible to obtain good data–model fits. The minimal reconstruction is clearly preferred by the sea‐level data. The ice reconstructions tested were not constrained by geomorphological information of past ice extent (lateral and vertical). As a consequence, the reconstructions extend further than much of this information suggests, particularly in terms of ice thickness. It is notable, however, that the reconstructions produce good fits to many sea‐level data from central, mountainous regions (e.g. Scottish highlands), which lends support to the suggestion that trimlines, often used as an constraint on the palaeo ice surface location, are in fact features formed at the transition from warm‐ to cold‐based ice and so mark a minimum constraint on the ice surface altitude. Based on data–model misfits, suggestions are made for improving the ice model reconstructions. However, in many locations, the cause of the misfit could be due to non‐local, predominantly Fennoscandian ice and so interpretation is not straightforward. As a result, we suggest that future analyses of this type consider models and observations for both Fennoscandia and the British Isles. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Holocene climate and glacial history of the northeastern Antarctic Peninsula: the marine sedimentary record from a long SHALDRIL core

A high-resolution record of Holocene deglacial and climate history was obtained from a 77 m sediment core from the Firth of Tay, Antarctic Peninsula, as part of the SHALDRIL initiative. This study provides a detailed sedimentological record of Holocene paleoclimate and glacial advance and retreat from the eastern side of the peninsula. A robust chronostratigraphy was derived from thirty-three radiocarbon dates on carbonate material. This chronostratigraphic framework was used to establish the timing of glacial and climate events derived from multiple proxies including: magnetic susceptibility, electric resistivity, porosity, ice-rafted debris content, organic carbon content, nitrogen content, biogenic silica content, and diatom and foraminiferal assemblages. The core bottomed-out in a stiff diamicton interpreted as till. Gravelly and sandy mud above the till is interpreted as proximal glaciomarine sediment that represents decoupling of the glacier from the seafloor circa 9400 cal. yr BP and its subsequent landward retreat. This was approximately 5000 yr later than in the Bransfield Basin and South Shetland Islands, on the western side of the peninsula. The Firth of Tay core site remained in a proximal glaciomarine setting until 8300 cal. yr BP, at which time significant glacial retreat took place. Deposition of diatomaceous glaciomarine sediments after 8300 cal. yr BP indicates that an ice shelf has not existed in the area since this time.The onset of seasonally open marine conditions between 7800 and 6000 cal. yr BP followed the deglacial period and is interpreted as the mid-Holocene Climatic Optimum. Open marine conditions lasted until present, with a minor cooling having occurred between 6000 and 4500 cal. yr BP and a period of minor glacial retreat and/or decreased sea ice coverage between 4500 and 3500 cal. yr BP. Finally, climatic cooling and variable sea ice cover occurred from 3500 cal. yr BP to near present and it is interpreted as being part of the Neoglacial. The onset of the Neoglacial appears to have occurred earlier in the Firth of Tay than on the western side of the Antarctic Peninsula. The Medieval Warm Period and Little Ice Age were not pronounced in the Firth of Tay. The breadth and synchroneity of the rapid regional warming and glacial retreat observed in the Antarctic Peninsula during the last century appear to be unprecedented during the Holocene epoch.     

Prediction of spatially distributed seismic demands in specific structures: Ground motion and structural response

The efficacy of various ground motion intensity measures (IMs) in the prediction of spatially distributed seismic demands (engineering demand parameters, (EDPs)) within a structure is investigated. This has direct implications to building‐specific seismic loss estimation, where the seismic demand on different components is dependent on the location of the component in the structure. Several common IMs are investigated in terms of their ability to predict the spatially distributed demands in a 10‐storey office building, which is measured in terms of maximum interstorey drift ratios and maximum floor accelerations. It is found that the ability of an IM to efficiently predict a specific EDP depends on the similarity between the frequency range of the ground motion that controls the IM and that of the EDP. An IMs predictability has a direct effect on the median response demands for ground motions scaled to a specified probability of exceedance from a ground motion hazard curve. All of the IMs investigated were found to be insufficient with respect to at least one of magnitude, source‐to‐site distance, or epsilon when predicting all peak interstorey drifts and peak floor accelerations in a 10‐storey reinforced concrete frame structure. Careful ground motion selection and/or seismic demand modification is therefore required to predict such a spatially distributed demands without significant bias. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Postglacial relative sea‐level observations from Ireland and their role in glacial rebound modelling

The British Isles have been the focus of a number of recent modelling studies owing to the existence of a high‐quality sea‐level dataset for this region and the suitability of these data for constraining shallow earth viscosity structure, local to regional ice sheet histories and the magnitude/timing of global meltwater signals. Until recently, the paucity of both glaciological and relative sea‐level (RSL) data from Ireland has meant that the majority of these glacial isostatic adjustment (GIA) modelling studies of the British Isles region have tended to concentrate on reconstructing ice cover over Britain. However, the recent development of a sea‐level database for Ireland along with emergence of new glaciological data on the spatial extent, thickness and deglacial chronology of the Irish Ice Sheet means it is now possible to revisit this region of the British Isles. Here, we employ these new data to constrain the evolution of the Irish Ice Sheet. We find that in order to reconcile differences between model predictions and RSL evidence, a thick, spatially extensive ice sheet of ～600–700 m over much of north and central Ireland is required at the LGM with very rapid deglaciation after 21 k cal. yr BP. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Ground motion directionality in the 2010–2011 Canterbury earthquakes

This paper examines the observed directionality of ground motions in the Christchurch urban area during the 2010–2011 Canterbury, New Zealand earthquakes. A dataset of ground motions recorded at 20 strong motion stations over 10 different earthquake events is utilized to examine the ratios of various response spectral directionality definitions and the orientation of the maximum direction. Because the majority of previous related studies have utilized overlapping ground motion datasets from the NGA database, the results of this study provide a largely independent assessment of these ground motion aspects. It is found that the directionality ratio between the maximum (100th percentile) and 50th percentile orientation‐independent spectral acceleration is similar to that obtained from recent studies. Ground motions from the 4 September 2010 Darfield earthquake are shown to exhibit strong directionality for source‐to‐site distances up to R_rup = 30 km, notably further than results from a previous study, which suggests that such effects are generally limited to R_rup < 5 km. The adopted dataset also offers the unique potential to consider site‐specific effects on directionality ratios and maximum direction orientations; however, in both cases, site‐specific effects are found not to be significant in the observed empirical results. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Discussion on ‘a framework for the evaluation of ground motion selection and modification procedures’ by N. Simon Kwong,Anil K. Chopra,and Robin K. McGuire

The paper under discussion proposes a framework to evaluate ground motion selection and modification procedures and illustrates its application for two different procedures as applied to a non‐degrading bilinear inelastic single‐degree‐of‐freedom system. This discussion focuses on providing additional context that this writer feels is needed in relation to both the proposed framework and also its specific application in the paper, which are important for the conclusions made by the authors. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Ground motion selection for scenario ruptures using the generalised conditional intensity measure (GCIM) method

In this paper, the generalised conditional intensity measure (GCIM) method is extended to ground motion selection for scenario earthquake ruptures. The selection algorithm is based on generating random realisations of the considered intensity measure (IM) distributions for a specific rupture scenario and then finding the prospective ground motions that best fit the realisations using an optimal amplitude scale factor. Using different rupture scenarios and site conditions, two important aspects of the GCIM methodology are scrutinised: (i) different weight vectors for the various IMs considered and (ii) quantifying the importance of replicate selections for ensembles with different numbers of desired ground motions. It is demonstrated that considering only spectral acceleration (SA) ordinates in the selection process, as is common in many conventional selection procedures, may result in selected motions with a biased representation for duration and cumulative ground motion effects. In contrast, considering IMs other than SA ordinates (in particular, significant duration, cumulative absolute velocity, and Arias intensity) results in ensembles with an appropriate representation of these IMs, without a practically significant effect on SA ordinates. The benefit of conducting replicate selections to obtain a suite of motions with an improved representation for the distribution of the considered IMs is demonstrated, and a minimum number of replicates are suggested for different ground motion ensemble sizes. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Depth and character of rock weathering across a basaltic‐hosted climosequence on Hawai‘i

Using field observations and geochemical and digital terrain analyses, we describe the structure and thickness of the regolith across a climosequence on the island of Hawai‘i to gain insight into the relative roles of precipitation and the near‐surface hydrologic structure in determining weathering patterns. In the wet portion of the climosequence, where the long‐term water balance is positive, the regolith thickness reaches an observed maximum of ~40 m and appears limited by the geomorphic base‐level of the landscape. However, even within this thick regolith, distinct units of varying weathering intensity occur; the vertical ordering of which largely reflects differences in the initial permeability structure of the basalt flows rather than a systematic decrease in weathering intensity downwards from the ground surface. In the dry portion of the climosequence, where the long‐term water balance is negative, the regolith thickness is confined to ~1 m, is highly dependent on the inferred permeability structure of the basalt flows, and is independent of geomorphic base‐level. Weathering intensity also varies according to permeability structure and decreases in this thin regolith with distance beneath the ground surface. The abrupt change in regolith depth and character that coincides with the transition from net‐positive to net‐negative long‐term water balance implies that small changes in precipitation rates around a neutral water balance result in large changes in the distribution and depth of weathering. Together our observations indicate that the distribution and depth of weathering in basalts (and probably other lithologies) might be best understood by considering how precipitation interacts with the complicated near‐surface permeability structure over regolith‐forming timescales to weather rock in the vadose zone. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.