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Mis à jour : 3 juillet 2019

A critical case-study to improve earthquake and tsunami anticipation

A fundamental question raised by the Tohoku-Oki earthquake is to know whether seismic rupture of giant earthquakes can be anticipated either in time (months, days or hours before the rupture), location and/or magnitude, and how, within 10 minutes after the quake, the amplitude of a tsunami can be estimated before it reaches the coast. Over the last decades, scientists have tried to address this question through different approaches, but mainly by (1) trying to isolate potential precursory signals or (2) improving our knowledge of the seismic cycle (how stress and strain balance over several earthquakes) to understand the physical parameters that control the size and location of those large earthquakes. More recently, a third more practical approach was developed called (3) early-warning which takes advantage of the slower propagation speed of seismic or tsunami waves compared to our communication networks to provide at least a few seconds or minutes to anticipate the approaching waves and gauge the threat they represent.

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