Presenter(s): Samuel Cooke
Faculty Mentor(s): Diego Melgar
Poster 77
Session: Sciences
The Cretaceous-Tertiary boundary is marked by a discrete lithologic marker and subsequent die- off of paleo species attributed to the Chicxulub meteorite impact. While many studies have investigated the global effects of the impact, which include a magnitude 10-11 earthquake, there has been limited investigation into the immediate effects triggered by the meteorite’s collision. Recently, in a paper published by DePalma et al, an on-shore surge deposit in North Dakota has been examined which contains a high-resolution chronology of the events that occurred immediately after the impact. The authors assert that in this flooding event, a tsunami is probably not the source, and instead a seismic generated seiche is responsible for the rapidly emplaced deposit. A seismic seiche (pronounced ‘saysh’) is an ephemeral standing wave that oscillates in a partially or fully enclosed basin of water in response to seismic waves. Currently there is a lack of data on seismic seiches that would serve to substantiate this claim. This research seeks to consolidate existing data on observed seiches in order to understand how earthquake and basin properties relate to seiche characteristics. To do this, published scientific papers containing observed seiche measurements in response to a seismic event were collected and characteristics such as earthquake magnitude, epicentral distance, seiche amplitude and magnitude as well as basin dimensions were analyzed. While this analysis is ongoing preliminary findings suggest a logarithmic relationship between epicentral distance and seiche amplitude.