1994 Kuril Islands earthquake

Earthquake

This earthquake was an intra-slab earthquake within the Pacific plate which is subducting beneath the Okhotsk microplate.

Damage

Oil storage tanks in Malokurilsk and Krabozavodsk were damaged. An oil leak occurred and caused heavy contamination of the port area.

Intensity

The intensity was MSK VI~IX in Shikotan Island.

The earthquake could be felt in Tokyo with shindo 3, and in Hokkaido, the highest intensity reached shindo 6.

Aftershocks

A large aftershock of magnitude 7.1 or 7.7 occurred on October 9, 1994, at 07:55 UTC. It was located at 43.97° N, 148.22° E with a depth of 33 km. It generated a tsunami, and a peak-to-trough tsunami wave height of 18 cm was recorded in Hanasaki, Japan.

Tsunami

A numerical simulation of the tsunami suggested that the first wave was caused by a significant subsidence north of the Kuril Islands due to the earthquake.

A peak-to-trough tsunami wave height of 3.46 m was recorded in Hanasaki, Japan.

This earthquake triggered a tsunami in the southern Kuril Islands and Hokkaido. The tsunami run-up height was more than 3 m in Yuzhno-Kurilsk bay and 5 m in Zelenyi Island, Russia.

The tsunami had a maximum runup height of 10.4 m at the southern part of Dimitrova Bay.

References

References

1. (1995). "The great Kurile Earthquake of October 4, 1994 tore the slab". Geophysical Research Letters.
2. (1996). "Seismic Quiescence before the Hokkaido-Toho-Oki Earthquake of October 4, 1994".
3. (January 1995). "Kuril Islands Earthquake of October 4, 1994". Earthquake Engineering Research Institute.
4. (1996). "An engineering analysis of the consequences of the Shikotan earthquake of October 4(5), 1994".
5. (June 1995). "Technical Note of the Port and Harbour Research Institute, Ministry of Transport, Japan".
6. (March 1996). "047 1994年北海道東方沖地震による釧路・根室・南千島の震度分布と建物被害(地震災害(1))". 日本建築学会北海道支部研究報告集.
7. "Generation of Tsunamis in the Okhotsk Sea Caused by the 1994 Great Kuril Earthquake" by Y. Tanioka
8. "Significant Earthquakes of the World 1994".
9. "Data catalogue for near-source tsunami observed in Kuril Isls and Sakhalin Is.".
10. "Tsunami Event: KURIL ISLANDS, RUSSIA". NGDC.
11. (1999). "A feasibility test of CMT inversion using regional network of broad-band strong-motion seismographs for near-distance large earthquakes". Earth, Planets and Space.
12. ISC. (2016). "ISC-GEM Global Instrumental Earthquake Catalogue (1900–2012)". [[International Seismological Centre]].
13. (September 4, 2009). "PAGER-CAT Earthquake Catalog". United States Geological Survey.