Fall AGU session announcement: July 17, 2006 Java Earthquake and Tsunami

We invite submissions to this late-breaking session on the recent Java earthquake and tsunami for AGU Fall 2006. For more information, please contact the conveners listed below.

The July 17, 2006 Java Earthquake and Tsunami: What are we learning?

At 08:19 GMT on 17 July 2006, a very large Mw=7.7 earthquake ruptured in the near-trench region south of western Java, Indonesia causing a locally devastating tsunami responsible for numerous casualties. This event is unique in that preliminary data suggest the earthquake had a very long duration for its magnitude, making it the first classic slow-source “tsunami earthquake” (TsE) to occur in the past 10 years. This event joins a short list including only three other TsE events that have occurred since the development and deployment of modern broad-band global seismology: Nicaragua 1992; Java 1994; and Peru 1996. The precise rupture processes and controlling mechanism of such TsEs are poorly understood, in part because they likely occur in a weak subduction interface that is often considered to be unable to nucleate earthquake rupture. Additionally, the mechanisms that are responsible for generating disproportionately large tsunamis from these events are not well understood. This session invites contributions that seek to improve identification and our understanding of this and other such slow-source TsE events, and the processes that control their tsunami generation. We are particularly interested in contributions that incorporate observational, theoretical and/or modeling that specifically address this most recent event TsE.

Conveners:
Andrew Newman
School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences
Georgia Institute of Technology
Atlanta, GA 30332
anewman@gatech.edu

Susan Bilek
Earth and Environmental Science Department
New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology
801 Leroy Place
Socorro, NM 87801
sbilek@nmt.edu