From Victoria, British Columbia, at a meeting of the Seismological Society of America
Scientists have long observed that the ground motions from an earthquake are stronger on a hill than they are on nearby plains. Now, they’re developing computer models that reflect that phenomenon.
Most previous simulations of a temblor’s ground motions on uneven terrain have emulated geologic features made of a single material or used simplified representations of earthquake waves, says Jacobo Bielak of Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh.