A further source of Tokyo earthquakes and Pacific Ocean tsunamis

Jessica E. Pilarczyk; Yuki Sawai; Yuichi Namegaya; Toru Tamura; Koichiro Tanigawa; Dan Matsumoto; Tetsuya Shinozaki; Osamu Fujiwara; Masanobu Shishikura; Yumi Shimada; Tina Dura; Benjamin P. Horton; Andrew C. Parnell; Christopher H. Vane

doi:10.1038/s41561-021-00812-2

A further source of Tokyo earthquakes and Pacific Ocean tsunamis

Jessica E. Pilarczyk^*
, Yuki Sawai
, Yuichi Namegaya
, Toru Tamura
, Koichiro Tanigawa
, Dan Matsumoto
, Tetsuya Shinozaki
, Osamu Fujiwara
, Masanobu Shishikura
, Yumi Shimada
, Tina Dura
, Benjamin P. Horton
, Andrew C. Parnell
, Christopher H. Vane

^*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Journal Publications and Reviews › RGC 21 - Publication in refereed journal › peer-review

18 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

Earthquake hazard assessments for the Tokyo Region are complicated by the trench–trench triple junction where the oceanic Philippine Sea Plate not only underthrusts a continental plate but is also being subducted by the Pacific Plate. Great thrust earthquakes and associated tsunamis are historically recognized hazards from the Continental/Philippine Sea (Sagami Trough) and Continental/Pacific (Japan Trench) plate boundaries but not from the Philippine Sea/Pacific (Izu–Bonin Trench) boundary alone. Here we employed a series of historical and hypothetical rupture models to explain the widespread distribution of geological evidence for an unusually large tsunami found along 50 km of coastline east of Tokyo. Dating to about 1,000 years ago, this inferred tsunami predates local written history by several hundred years. We found that the inland extent of its sand sheet is best explained, in computer simulations, by displacement on one of the three plate boundaries offshore of the Boso Peninsula, which corresponds to the triple junction. The minimum magnitude scenario capable of generating the inland extent of inundation involves displacement along the Philippine Sea/Pacific boundary megathrust. This plate-boundary fault adds another potential source for earthquakes in the Tokyo Region and tsunamis in the Pacific Ocean. © 2021, The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Limited.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	796-800
Journal	Nature Geoscience
Volume	14
Issue number	10
Online published	2 Sept 2021
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1038/s41561-021-00812-2
Publication status	Published - Oct 2021
Externally published	Yes

Funding

We thank B. Atwater, K. Satake and K. Ioki for their comments on an earlier version of the manuscript. This work is a contribution to IGCP Project 725, was supported by the Geological Survey of Japan, National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST) and in part by grants awarded to J.E.P. (National Science Foundation (EAR-1303881 and 1624612), Natural Sciences and Engineering Council of Canada (NSERC), Canada Research Chair (CRC) program and Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS) International Research Fellows (Geological Survey of Japan, AIST, PE14038)), A.C.P. (Science Foundation Ireland Career Development Award (17/ CDA/4695), Investigator Award (16/IA/4520), Marine Research Programme funded by the Irish Government, co-financed by the European Regional Development Fund (Grant-Aid Agreement no. PBA/CC/18/01), European Union\u2019s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement no. 818144 and SFI Research Centre (16/RC/3872 and 12/RC/2289_P2)) and B.P.H. (Singapore Ministry of Education Academic Research Fund (MOE2019-T3-1-004), National Research Foundation Singapore and Singapore Ministry of Education, under the Research Centers of Excellence initiative). This work is Earth Observatory of Singapore contribution 382. CT scanning (Fig. ED2I) was performed under the cooperative research programme of the Center for Advanced Marine Core Research (CMCR), Kochi University (no. 17A008). C.H.V. publishes with the permission of the Executive Director British Geological Survey.

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abstract = "Earthquake hazard assessments for the Tokyo Region are complicated by the trench–trench triple junction where the oceanic Philippine Sea Plate not only underthrusts a continental plate but is also being subducted by the Pacific Plate. Great thrust earthquakes and associated tsunamis are historically recognized hazards from the Continental/Philippine Sea (Sagami Trough) and Continental/Pacific (Japan Trench) plate boundaries but not from the Philippine Sea/Pacific (Izu–Bonin Trench) boundary alone. Here we employed a series of historical and hypothetical rupture models to explain the widespread distribution of geological evidence for an unusually large tsunami found along 50 km of coastline east of Tokyo. Dating to about 1,000 years ago, this inferred tsunami predates local written history by several hundred years. We found that the inland extent of its sand sheet is best explained, in computer simulations, by displacement on one of the three plate boundaries offshore of the Boso Peninsula, which corresponds to the triple junction. The minimum magnitude scenario capable of generating the inland extent of inundation involves displacement along the Philippine Sea/Pacific boundary megathrust. This plate-boundary fault adds another potential source for earthquakes in the Tokyo Region and tsunamis in the Pacific Ocean. {\textcopyright} 2021, The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Limited.",

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A further source of Tokyo earthquakes and Pacific Ocean tsunamis

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