A Broadband Seismic Deployment in Jordan

Abstract

In 1983 a short-period seismic network was established in the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan in cooperation with the United States Geological Survey (USGS). This network continues to operate under the direction of the Jordan Seismological Observatory (JSO) within the Natural Resources Authority (NRA). In 1998 two broadband seismic stations were deployed in Jordan as part of a cooperative project between JSO, USGS, and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL). The purpose of this deployment, which continues today, is to obtain long-period constraints on earthquake source parameters, improve estimates of magnitudes and crustal and upper-mantle structure, and obtain ground-truth data for nuclear explosion monitoring calibration. In this paper we demonstrate the value of the broadband instruments in Jordan by using the data to characterize earthquake and mining sources and estimate crustal structure using some simple examples. We also describe an openly available data product containing event-oriented waveforms for use by researchers. One station is located in southern Jordan near Hittiyah (HIT), and the other is located in northeastern Jordan near Ruweishid (RUW). Station locations are given in Table 1. Figure 1 shows the JSO/LLNL/USGS stations, stations from regional networks, various mines, and recorded seismicity in the region. The numerous short-period stations of the national networks in the region record the seismicity along the Gulf of Aqaba and the Dead Sea Transform. Only a few broadband stations are in the region outside of the Dead Sea Transform to make long-period observations of events and estimate source parameters and structure. The Geophysical Institute of Israel (GII) operates broadband stations along the Dead Sea Transform. King Abdulaziz City for Science and Technology (KACST, Saudi Arabia) operates broadband stations in the Gulf of Aqaba region. The broadband stations in Jordan provide an opportunity to sample the structure of the northwestern Arabian Platform. View this table: TABLE 1 Station Locations The …