Detection of debris-flow events from seismic signals using Benford’s law

Abstract

The first step in building an early warning system using seismic signals is to automatically identify events of interest. Here, the first digit distribution of seismic signals generated by debris flows and other surface processes was calculated to validate compliance with Benford's law (BL). A detector model for debris flow events was introduced based on amplitude range and goodness of fit of BL. We show that seismic signals generated by debris flows, landslides, and bedload transport follow the BL. These events release more energy and last longer than rockfalls, which do not follow BL. In the test dataset with 1224 samples, the accuracy of the detector model in identifying debris flow events was 0.75.