Joint inversion of ocean-bottom pressure and GNSS data from the 2003 Tokachi-oki earthquake

Abstract

Abstract When the 2003 Tokachi-oki earthquake generated a large tsunami off eastern Hokkaido, Japan, it was detected by cabled ocean-bottom pressure gauges (OBPs) installed within the seismic source region. The OBP records included characteristic features of tsunami waveforms in the source region, indicating significant offset due to the permanent sea-bottom displacement, which can provide critical information about the earthquake source. However, no studies have considered the OBP tsunami data observed in the focal region for the source inversion of the Tokachi-oki earthquake. Here, in order to better understand the 2003 Tokachi-oki earthquake source, we estimate the spatial distribution of fault slip by conducting a joint inversion using two different datasets: tsunami data from four OBPs, located in the focal region and about 300 km away to the south, as well as Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) data obtained throughout Hokkaido and northern Honshu. Through our joint inversion, we found that the most dominant slip peak is located 40 km northwest from the hypocenter with an abnormally large slip of $$\sim$$ ∼ 15 m. This large slip may result from releasing a high amount of slip deficit accumulated by a stick–slip patch surrounded by stable slip regions on the southernmost Kuril subduction zone. By comparing the OBP observations and the synthetic tsunami waveforms derived from our fault model and other fault models, we conclude that the OBP tsunami data recorded within the focal region better constrained the magnitude and the location of the slip compared to other geophysical data. Graphical Abstract

Keywords

• The 2003 Tokachi-oki earthquake
• Ocean-bottom pressure gauges
• Tsunami
• Geodetic data
• Joint inversion