Numerical modeling of water waves recorded by a subbottom seismometer in the southwest Pacific

Abstract

The amplitudes of water waves generated by shallow explosive sources and recorded by a subbottom seismometer provide constraints on velocity and attenuation parameters of oceanic sediments and upper oceanic crust. Analysis of data collected during the 1983 Ngendei Seismic Experiment in the southwest Pacific Ocean illustrates this method. The data were recorded by a triaxial geophone emplaced 54 m into the basaltic basement. Synthetic seismograms are computed using wave number integration for several crustal models to determine the sensitivity of water wave amplitudes to specific parameters of the sediments and oceanic crust. The synthetic seismograms fit the recorded data to better than a factor of 2 for frequencies as high as 15 Hz and ranges out to 30 km. The amplitude of the direct water wave beyond critical incidence (“direct wave root”) indicates that the sediment P wave velocity is near 1.8 km/s. Modeling of the attenuation of shear wave reverberations in the sediments indicates that sediment Qβ is between 30 and 50. Modulations in water wave amplitude as a function of receiver offset are related to the velocity of the upper oceanic crust. The distances at which amplitude maxima occur indicate that the shear wave velocity of the upper crust at the Ngendei site is 2.4±0.1 km/s. This is an important result since reliable estimates of the shear wave velocity of upper oceanic crust are rare. The distances at which amplitude minima occur are used to constrain the compressional wave velocity of the uppermost crust. However, the modulations do not resolve the compressional wave velocity of the crust as well as the shear wave velocity. The relative amplitudes of successive water waves indicate that the reflection coefficient at the sediment‐basement interface is 0.66. This further constrains the compressional wave velocity of the upper crust. Using estimates of the sediment properties and crustal shear wave velocity, the compressional wave velocity of the upper crust at the Ngendei site is estimated from this reflection coefficient to be 4.3–4.4 km/s. A method for estimating the velocity gradient in the upper kilometer of the crust from the interference of water waves with upgoing crustal refractions is presented. Application of the method to these data indicate that the shear wave velocity gradient is about 1.0 s−1, which is indistinguishable from the previous determination by Shearer and Orcutt (1986) using a quite different methodology. The velocity of the upper crust at the Ngendei site is consistent with velocities reported for other regions of similar crustal age (>100 m.y.) and is much greater than velocities typically found for young oceanic crust (<5 m.y.). This lends support to current theories regarding the evolution of the uppermost oceanic crust that attribute higher velocities in older crust to the closing of cracks and pores.