Analysis of long-term observations of the groundwater level In an aseismic region

Abstract

The results of the analysis of continuous precise time series of atmospheric pressure and groundwater level fluctuations in a well drilled to a depth of 400 m in the territory of Moscow are presented. The observations are remarkable in terms of their duration of more than 22 years (from February 2, 1993 to April 4, 2015) and by the sampling interval of 10 min. These long observations are suitable for exploring the stationarity of the properties of hydrogeological time series in a seismically quiet region, which is important from the methodological standpoint for interpreting the similar observations in seismically active regions aimed at earthquake prediction. Factor and cluster analysis applied to the sequence of multivariate vectors ofthe statistical properties of groundwater level time series in the successive 10-day windows after adaptive compensation for atmospheric pressure effects distinguish five different statistically significant states of the time series with the transitions between them. An attempt to geophysically interpret the revealed states is made. Two significant periods – 46 and 275 days – are established by spectral analysis of the sequence of the transitions times between the clusters.