Simulation of Northridge Earthquake Aftershock

Image by Gregory Foss, PSC

Simulation of an earthquake aftershock was performed on the PSC Cray T3D by Jacobo Bielak, Omar Ghattas and the Quake Group at Carnegie Mellon University. The shock occurred in Northridge, California in 1994. The model propagates seismic waves through the basin, simulating motion within the basin as well as at its surface. Color depicts the peak magnitude of ground displacement. The simulation superimposed on a satellite view of topography covered a 54 x 33 km. area to a depth of 15 km.

More information on this research can be found in:

• an article from Projects in Scientific Computing, our annual research report.
• an animation from the Scientific Visualization group's gallery of animations.