Product catalogue
Macroseismic effects, locations and magnitudes of some early Tasmanian earthquakes
The Richter magnitude, ML, for historical earthquakes can be obtained from the Modified Mercalli intensity, I, and hypocentral distance, R (km) using the formula ML = 1.13 In R + 0.6671 - 2.60. A magnitude is calculated from each intensity contour with a mean radius greater than 35 km, and the arithmetic mean of these magnitudes is designated MI. It approximates ML, usually to half a magnitude unit or better. For Tasmanian and Victorian events where the MMIII contour is not included in the magnitude determination, a correction of -0.2 should be applied to MI. For New South Wales earthquakes, the correction is -0.1. Isoseismal maps prepared from felt reports in contemporary newspapers were used to determine the epicentres and magnitudes of what are probably the five largest western Tasmanian earthquakes from 1853 to 1957: Circular Head, 21 November 1859, MI 5.4; South West Tasmania, 3 February 1880, MI 5.5; Queenstown, 4 May 1908, MI 4.8; West Coast, 4 November 1911 , MI 4.8; and West Coast, 1 March 1924, MI 5.2. All were felt with a maximum intensity of at least MMVI. The South West Tasmania event, the largest historic western Tasmanian earthquake, may have occurred on the Lake Edgar fault, but its epicentre is not well-constrained. The Tasmanian earthquake swarm of 1883-1892 consisted of around 2000 events felt in the northeastern Tasmanian region. The activity occurred at the rate of at least one event per month from April 1883 to May 1887, and there were at least two events each year up to and including 1892, when the series ended. Isoseismal maps were drawn from contemporary newspaper reports and publications, and epicentres and magnitudes determined for the three largest events: 26 January 1892, MI 6.9; 12 May 1885, MI 6.8; and 13 July 1884, MI 6.4. All three earthquakes were felt from southeastern New South Wales in the north to Hobart in the south, and each caused minor damage in Launceston. Their epicentres were located in the Tasman Sea off the northeastern tip of Tasmania. The MI 6.9 (±0.4) event of 1892 is the largest historic earthquake recorded in eastern Australia. In 1883, Alfred Barrett Biggs of Launceston, Tasmania, built and operated the first seismoscopes used in Australia. From his measurements and the epicentres determined above,the instrumental Richter magnitudes of the 1884 and 1885 events have been calculated as ML 6.2 and 6.5, respectively, in good agreement with their intensity-deduced magnitudes, MI 6.4 and 6.8.
Simple
Identification info
- Date (Publication)
- 1989-01-01T00:00:00
- Citation identifier
- Geoscience Australia Persistent Identifier/https://pid.geoscience.gov.au/dataset/ga/81241
- Cited responsible party
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Role Organisation / Individual Name Details Publisher Bureau of Mineral Resources, Geology and Geophysics
Canberra Author Michael-Leiba, M.O.
1
- Name
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BMR Journal of Australian Geology and Geophysics
- Issue identification
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11:1:89-99
- Point of contact
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Role Organisation / Individual Name Details Custodian Corp
Owner Commonwealth of Australia (Geoscience Australia)
Custodian Commonwealth of Australia (Geoscience Australia)
Voice
- Topic category
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- Geoscientific information
Extent
))
- Maintenance and update frequency
- Unknown
Resource format
- Title
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Product data repository: Various Formats
- Website
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Data Store directory containing the digital product files
Data Store directory containing one or more files, possibly in a variety of formats, accessible to Geoscience Australia staff only for internal purposes
- Keywords
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GA Publication
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Journal
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- Keywords
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TAS
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- Australian and New Zealand Standard Research Classification (ANZSRC)
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Earth Sciences
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- Keywords
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Published_External
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Resource constraints
- Title
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Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Licence
- Alternate title
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CC-BY
- Edition
-
4.0
- Access constraints
- License
- Use constraints
- License
Resource constraints
- Title
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Australian Government Security ClassificationSystem
- Edition date
- 2018-11-01T00:00:00
- Classification
- Unclassified
- Language
- English
- Character encoding
- UTF8
Distribution Information
- Distributor contact
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Role Organisation / Individual Name Details Distributor Commonwealth of Australia (Geoscience Australia)
Voice
- OnLine resource
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Journal article (pdf)
Journal article (pdf)
- Distribution format
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pdf
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Resource lineage
- Statement
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Unknown
- Hierarchy level
- Non geographic dataset
- Other
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GA Publication
- Description
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Source data not available.
Metadata constraints
- Title
-
Australian Government Security ClassificationSystem
- Edition date
- 2018-11-01T00:00:00
- Classification
- Unclassified
Metadata
- Metadata identifier
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urn:uuid/fae9173a-70b6-71e4-e044-00144fdd4fa6
- Title
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GeoNetwork UUID
- Language
- English
- Character encoding
- UTF8
- Contact
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Role Organisation / Individual Name Details Point of contact Commonwealth of Australia (Geoscience Australia)
Voice
Type of resource
- Resource scope
- Document
- Name
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AGSO BMR Journal
Alternative metadata reference
- Title
-
Geoscience Australia - short identifier for metadata record with
uuid
- Citation identifier
- eCatId/81241
- Date info (Revision)
- 2018-04-20T06:08:16
- Date info (Creation)
- 2014-06-03T00:00:00
Metadata standard
- Title
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AU/NZS ISO 19115-1:2014
Metadata standard
- Title
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ISO 19115-1:2014
Metadata standard
- Title
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ISO 19115-3
- Title
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Geoscience Australia Community Metadata Profile of ISO 19115-1:2014
- Edition
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Version 2.0, September 2018
- Citation identifier
- https://pid.geoscience.gov.au/dataset/ga/122551