Seismic tomography in the source region of the May 29th 2008 earthquake-aftershock-sequence in southwest Iceland

• Main Author: Berglund, Karin
• Format: Bachelor Thesis
• Language: English
• Published: Uppsala universitet, Geofysik 2012
• Subjects: seismic tomography; Iceland; Mid-Atlantic ridge; seismisk tomografi; Island; mittatlantiska ryggen; Mid-Atlantic Ridge
• Online Access: http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:uu:diva-187589

On May 29th 2008 two earthquakes with moment magnitude of Mw ~6 occurred in the southwestern part of Iceland. The second earthquake struck within only seconds after the first, on a fault ~5 km west from the first fault. The aftershock sequence was recorded by 14 seismic stations during the subsequent 34 days. The recorded earthquakes were detected and located with a Coalesence Microseismic Mapping (CMM) technique. The output data from this program has been used as basis for the tomography algorithm PStomo_eq, which simultaneously inverts for both P- and S-wave velocities and relocates the events. Within the study area of 46×36 km the three-dimensional velocity structure has, successfully but not conclusively, been modeled to depths of ~10 km. The Vp/Vs ratio varies from 1.74 to 1.82 within the study area. The velocity increases with depth starting from 2 km where the P-wave velocity is 4.6 km/s and the S-wave velocity is 2.7 km/s, at a depth of 10 km the P-wave velocity is 6.9 km/s and S-wave velocity is 4.0 km/s. In the horizontal slices a high velocity area is seen in the northwestern part of model. This is interpreted to be caused by a magma body rising up from below and lithifying at high pressure. From cross-sections a large low velocity zone is seen in the western part of model area concentrated above the seismicity. The low velocity anomaly is found between depths of 2 km to 4 km, stretching from 21.5° to 21.2° W. It is interpreted to be caused by high porosity within the area. The depth to the brittle crust is increasing from the western part of the model towards the eastern part, right in the middle of the model it abruptly decreases again. The depth to the base of the brittle crust is increasing from 7 km in west to 9 km in the middle of model. Den 29:e maj 2008 inträffade två jordbävningar med magnitud Mw ~6 på sydvästra Island. Den första jordbävningen följdes tätt av en andra jordbävning på en förkastning ~5 km väster om den första. Påföljande efterskalvssekvens registrerades av 14 seismiska ...