Probabilistic location of early instrumental earthquakes based on macroseismic and instrumental data

Abstract

There are regions of moderate seismicity that have long lacked a dense network of seismic stations due to their sparse population, inaccessibility, and low economic levels. Characterization of earthquakes in such regions is typically limited to the small amount of macroseismic information available and data from only one or two seismic stations. Most often, the location of such earthquakes was based on the use of macroseismic information alone. We propose a method for probabilistic estimation of the location of such earthquakes based on a joint analysis of their macroseismic and instrumental data. The technique is implemented in the ProLoM program (Probabilistic Locator by Macroseismics). In this study, we test the performance of the method on a test earthquake of May 20, 1967 and present the results of the analysis of the earthquakes that occurred in the north of the East European Platform on June 30, 1911 and January 13, 1939.