A GNSS Survey of the Ramu-Markham Fault, Papua New Guinea

<div>The Ramu-Markham Fault (RMF) runs along the northern edge of the Markham Valley in eastern Papua New Guinea’s Morobe Province. It is the active plate boundary between the South Bismarck Plate and&nbsp;the New Guinea Highlands/Papuan Peninsula Blocks, and is thought to accommodate about 4 cm/yr of convergence associated with the Finisterre arc-continent collision. Because Papua New Guinea’s recently published national seismic hazard map revealed a potential vulnerability of its 2nd largest city, Lae, to RMF earthquakes, Lae has become the focus of a seismic risk study. One of the aims of this study is to improve the characterisation of the earthquake potential along the RMF, and for this reason a new Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) campaign has been undertaken to re-survey over 70 existing benchmarks in and around Morobe Province, including about 35 benchmarks in and around the city of Lae itself. The vast majority of these benchmarks have now been surveyed, and in this paper we discuss the survey and a preliminary analysis of the data.</div><div><br></div>Presented at the 2023 Australian Earthquake Engineering Society (AEES) Conference