Event Date
Forwarding Ground Failure Research: Lessons from Two Post-Earthquake Reconnaissance Trips
Post-earthquake reconnaissance provides perishable field data that are critical for advancing our understanding of earthquake-induced ground failure and improving the relevant models engineers use for design. I describe my experiences with two recent post-earthquake reconnaissance efforts: the 2018 Mw 7.5 Palu-Donggala earthquake in Indonesia, which triggered devastating flowslides in the East Palu Valley, and the 2023 Mw 7.8 and Mw 7.5 Türkiye earthquake sequence, which produced over 345 km of surface fault rupture along the East Anatolian Fault. For each event, I describe the scientific questions that motivated the reconnaissance, the field and remote sensing techniques used to collect data, and how the resulting observations are being used to evaluate and improve fault displacement and ground failure models. Key findings include evidence that magnitude self-similarity breaks down near Mw 7.5 for fault displacement, the critical role of measurement uncertainty in field-based displacement estimates, and the value of combining remote sensing with traditional field methods. The presentation closes with practical lessons for conducting effective and respectful post-disaster reconnaissance.
Speaker Ben Mason is an associate professor in the Department of Geological Sciences and Engineering at the University of Nevada, Reno (UNR) and a licensed professional engineer in the state of Colorado. Before joining UNR, Ben also held research and academic positions at the U.S. Geological Survey and Oregon State University. Ben’s research interests lie in sediment-fluid-structure interaction during earthquakes, tsunamis, and cascading hazards. To strengthen his research ideas, Ben performs post-disaster reconnaissance, including recent trips to Türkiye following the 2023 earthquakes, Taiwan following the 2022 earthquake, and Indonesia following the 2018 earthquake.