Historical faulting as the possible cause of earthquake damages in the ancient Roman port city of Ostia

This paper presents an original multidisciplinary (geological-structural-geomorphological and seismological) study aimed at investigating the origin of diffused seismic damages affecting several ancient buildings in the Roman port city of Ostia. We also evaluate the possibility to relate these damag...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of seismology 2020-08, Vol.24 (4), p.833-851
Main Authors: Marra, Fabrizio, Milana, Giuliano, Pecchioli, Laura, Roselli, Pamela, Cangi, Giovanni, Famiani, Daniela, Mercuri, Alessia, Carlucci, Giorgia
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Amplification
Aseismic buildings
Coexistence
Damage assessment
Earth and Environmental Science
Earth Sciences
Earthquake damage
Earthquakes
Geology
Geomorphology
Geophysics/Geodesy
Geotechnical Engineering & Applied Earth Sciences
Ground motion
Historic sites
Historical buildings
Hydrogeology
Noise measurement
Original Article
Ratios
Seismic activity
Seismology
Structural Geology
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Summary:This paper presents an original multidisciplinary (geological-structural-geomorphological and seismological) study aimed at investigating the origin of diffused seismic damages affecting several ancient buildings in the Roman port city of Ostia. We also evaluate the possibility to relate these damages to a previously hypothesized ENE-WSW trending fault, bordering the morphological height upon which the Ostia town was founded. Aimed at this scope, we performed seismic noise measures (by using 14 seismic stations) that show no significantly different response and lack of significant ground motion differential amplifications. The coexistence of (i) no local geological heterogeneities and (ii) low amplification of spectral ratios in the recorded seismic signals seems to exclude that the observed seismic damage may be the consequence of significant site effects. When also the large distance from the strongest Apennine’s seismogenic source areas is considered, the possibility that the observed damage may be the consequence of local events should be considered. We discuss the potentiality of the ENE-WSW trending fault as the source of the observed seismic damages, highlighting the supporting evidence as well as the uncertainties of such interpretation.
ISSN:1383-4649
1573-157X
DOI:10.1007/s10950-019-09844-z