During the early evening of 28 September 2018, a magnitude-7.5 earthquake struck along the coast of northwestern Sulawesi, Indonesia. This region hosts a famous strike-slip fault system...
Earthquake Geology
Director Kerry Sieh’s principal research interest is earthquake geology, which uses geological layers and landforms to understand the geometries of active faults, the earthquakes they generate, and the crustal structure their movements produce. His early work on the San Andreas fault led to the discovery of how often and how regularly it produces large earthquakes in southern California.
More recently, his group has begun a study of the earthquake geology of Myanmar and New Guinea. Current research is especially focused on the subduction megathrust that produced the devastating giant Aceh-Andaman earthquake and Indian Ocean tsunami of 2004.
Blog
Latest Publications
"Rethinking Seismic Source Model of Probabilistic Hazard Assessment in Taiwan after the 2018 Hualien, Taiwan, Earthquake Sequence." Seismological Research Letters 90 (2019): 88-96.
"Stratigraphic Control of Frontal Décollement Level and Structural Vergence and Implications for Tsunamigenic Earthquake Hazard in Sumatra, Indonesia." Geochemistry, Geophysics, Geosystems 20 (2019).
"Archaeological evidence that a late 14th-century tsunami devastated the coast of northern Sumatra and redirected history." Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America (2019).
"Coulomb stress perturbation after great earthquakes in the Sumatran subduction zone: Potential impacts in the surrounding region." Journal of Asian Earth Sciences 180 (2019).
Events
10 Dec 2018 to 14 Dec 2018
10 Oct 2018 to 11 Oct 2018
Collaborators
Latest Projects
Paleotsunami studies have shown that the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami could have been anticipated.
The basaltic Bolaven volcanic field covers 11,000 km2 of southern Laos and has erupted often in the past half-a-million years. Nonetheless, the exposure of populations and infrastructure to its volcanic hazards is unknown.
This project is a multi-lateral collaboration between several EOS researchers and colleagues at other research institutions to study the tectonics and earthquakes of Southeast Asia.
The marine geophysical data collected during the 2015 MEGA-TERA expedition provide a unique window into the near-trench structure of the Sumatran accretionary wedge.
Formally established in September 2016, the Singapore‐WiscAr Partnership (SWAP) facilitates collaboration between the Earth Observatory of Singapore and the WiscAr Geochronology Laboratory at the University of Wisconsin‐Madison, with emphasis on...
Awards
2018
Honorary Membership, Association of Environmental and Engineering Geologists
2017
AXA Fellowship
2014