Natural Hazards and Earth System Sciences (Apr 2011)
Non-inductive components of electromagnetic signals associated with L'Aquila earthquake sequences estimated by means of inter-station impulse response functions
Abstract
On 6 April 2009 at 01:32:39 UT a strong earthquake occurred west of L'Aquila at the very shallow depth of 9 km. The main shock local magnitude was <i>M</i><sub>l</sub> = 5.8 (<i>M</i><sub>w</sub> = 6.3). Several powerful aftershocks occurred the following days. The epicentre of the main shock occurred 6 km away from the Geomagnetic Observatory of L'Aquila, on a fault 15 km long having a NW-SE strike, about 140°, and a SW dip of about 42°. For this reason, L'Aquila seismic events offered very favourable conditions to detect possible electromagnetic emissions related to the earthquake. The data used in this work come from the permanent geomagnetic Observatories of L'Aquila and Duronia. Here the results concerning the analysis of the residual magnetic field estimated by means of the inter-station impulse response functions in the frequency band from 0.3 Hz to 3 Hz are shown.