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Ground motion simulations for seismic stations in southern and eastern Romania and seismic hazard assessment

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Abstract

This research focuses on the evaluation of soil conditions for seismic stations in southern and eastern Romania, their influence on stochastic finite-fault simulations, and the impact of using them on the seismic hazard assessment. First, the horizontal-to-vertical spectral ratios (HVSR) are evaluated using ground motions recorded in 32 seismic stations during small magnitude (M W  ≤ 6.0) Vrancea seismic events. Most of the seismic stations situated in the southern part of Romania exhibit multiple HVSR peaks over a broad period range. However, only the seismic stations in the eastern-most part of Romania have clear short-period predominant periods. Subsequently, stochastic finite-fault simulations are performed in order to evaluate the influence of the soil conditions on the ground motion amplitudes. The analyses show that the earthquake magnitude has a larger influence on the computed ground motion amplitudes for the short- and medium-period range, while the longer-period spectral ordinates tend to be influenced more by the soil conditions. Next, the impact of the previously evaluated soil conditions on the seismic hazard results for Romania is also investigated. The results reveal a significant impact of the soil conditions on the seismic hazard levels, especially for the sites characterized by long-period amplifications (sites situated mostly in southern Romania), and a less significant influence in the case of sites which have clear short predominant periods.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by a grant of the Romanian National Authority for Scientific Research and Innovation, CNCS–UEFISCDI, project number PN-II-RU-TE-2014-4-0697. The support is gratefully acknowledged. The constructive feedback from one anonymous reviewer and from the Associate Editor Kuvvet Atakan is greatly appreciated as it has led to a much-improved version of the manuscript.

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  1. Seismic Risk Assessment Research Center, Technical University of Civil Engineering Bucharest, Bucharest, Romania

    Florin Pavel & Radu Vacareanu

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  1. Florin Pavel
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  2. Radu Vacareanu
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Correspondence to Florin Pavel.

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Pavel, F., Vacareanu, R. Ground motion simulations for seismic stations in southern and eastern Romania and seismic hazard assessment. J Seismol 21, 1023–1037 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10950-017-9649-1

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