Historical Seismograms - Evidence from the AD 2000 Izu Islands ...

Analysis of the Eastern Mediterranean Earthquake of 20 May 1202 195,III,' 30I,,' 1202_. II10II20200 100 1000Figure 3. Comparison of the felt areas of the earthquakes of 20 May 1202, 26 June1926 (Ms = 7.0, m = 7.5) and 11 July 1927 (Ms = 6.0, m = 6.4).of only 6.0 (* 0.1) from 20 station estimates (m = 6.4). The shock was centered at32.0' N and 35.4' E. It destroyed hundreds of houses on both sides of the JordanRiver, killing 361 people and injuring about 1,000. Detailed studies of this eventhave been published by Sieberg (1932a, b), Berloty (1927) and more recently byVered and Striem (1976). This earthquake must be described as one which excitedwidespread interest and sympathy rather on account of where it happened thanbecause of its special violence, and its effects have been overestimated. Our reevaluationof its effects, based on official reports compiled by the British and Frenchauthorities, shows that Sieberg's intensity assessments are greatly exaggerated andthat the radius of perceptibility he deduces, of 600 km, contains large areas fromwhich negative reports predominate (see Berloty, 1927, p. 80-81). On Figure 3 weshow an area of radius only 300 km where the shock was felt at intensity I11 (MSK),and on Figure 2 the epicenter of this event is shown with respect to the epicentrslregion of the 1202 earthquake. The 1927 earthquake was followed by a long seriesof aftershocks which terminated on 22 February 1928 with a damaging shock ofn/r, = 5.2 (+ 0.2) that was centered in the Judean Hills.The earthquake of 16 March 1956 was a smaller, double shock consisting of twoevents of Ms = 5.0 (k 0.1) and 5.1 (i O.l), both shocks having rn = 5.6, occurringwithin ten minutes of each other. The epicentral region was situated in the Shouf