On the Probabilistic Seismic Hazard Estimate for Húsavík, North Iceland on the Basis of Monte Carlo Methods

Abstract eng:
Húsavík, the second largest town in North Iceland, is effectively located, directly on top of the Húsavík–Flatey Fault (HFF), the largest transform fault in Iceland. The diverse geology and topography under the town is likely to contribute to localized differences in site effects and spatially variable earthquake strong-motions, indicating significant relative differences in seismic risk to its inhabitants. Previous earthquake hazard estimates of this region have relied on a single ground motion model and incorporated uncertainties in a limited way, but pointing out several ways to improve the hazard estimates. In this paper, a probabilistic seismic hazard analysis (PSHA) of the area of Húsavík in terms of peak ground acceleration (PGA) and spectral accelerations (SA) is presented using the Monte-Carlo (MC-PSHA) and Cornell-McGuire (CM-PSHA) methods, respectively. We considered different ground-motion models and selected the best model based on data-driven approaches. Both aleatory and epistemic uncertainties are taken into account. Moreover, the disaggregation of the seismic hazard is carried out to identify hazard-dominating events. The presented results shed further light on the earthquake hazard of Húsavík with implications for the associated seismic risk.

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