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Central US HAZUS Earthquake Scenarios
The New Madrid seismic zone has three
primary arms, or thrust faults (northeast, central, and southwest).
In August of 2005, CUSEC, FEMA, and the US Geological Survey worked
on creating a scenario for all three arms of the New Madrid. This
scenario, designed for planning purposes only, would show what type
of damage could be expected from a large earthquake occurring on
each of the three arms.
A study region incorporating the counties most at risk in the
central United States was created for these scenarios. This scenario
uses a magnitude 7.7 in each of the arms of the seismic zone, a
magnitude which reflects the 1811-1812 events. The USGS supplied
peak ground acceleration data (hazard maps) for the three arms
at this magnitude. The CUSEC State Geologists liquefaction map
was input into HAZUS as well, and an analysis was performed for
each thrust. The summary reports from these scenarios are available below.
While these events are independent of each other, the New Madrid
seismic zone is capable of producing a series of earthquakes, such
as the 1811-1812 events, which produced large earthquakes several
months apart, in each of the three arms. Unfortunately, HAZUS is
not capable of estimating losses for this type of cascading event,
so the results in these reports are not cumulative. Since updated building and inventory data have not been input
into these scenarios, it is important to note that economic losses
for these events might not be completely accurate. Again, these
reports should be used for planning purposes only, and are not
meant to show what will happen, but what might happen. |
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is available to be downloaded or read in Adobe Acrobat (.pdf)
format. All of the reports listed here are available for viewing
and download in .pdf format. If you do not have the Adobe Acrobat
Reader, you can get it by clicking on the icon below.
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