2003 Volume 56 Issue 1 Pages 39-57
The method of the inversion analysis to evaluate the distribution of seismic energy radiated from an earthquake fault plane based on seismic intensity distribution data has been developed. The fault plane is divided into small sub-faults. The optimized seismic energy distribution of each sub-fault is calculated using the least square method to minimize the error between evaluated and observed seismic intensities.
The energy distribution of a seismic fault is related to seismic intensity using the attenuation formula with equivalent hypocentral distance. The parameters of the attenuation formula are obtained from a regression analysis with measured seismic intensity data of recent moderate earthquakes.
The forward analyses using an assumed model are performed to verify the accuracy of the inversion analysis and to evaluate the effect of factors such as the standard deviation of seismic intensity, constraint condition of inversion analysis and configuration of observation stations.
Finally, the method is applied to the Showa Tonankai earthquake in 1944 and the Showa Nankai earthquake in 1946 and the result is compared with the tsunami and strong motion waveform inversion results to confirm the efficiency and applicability of the method.
