FUSION OF MULTI PRECURSORS EARTHQUAKE PARAMETERS TO ESTIMATE THE DATE, MAGNITUDE AND AFFECTED AREA OF THE FORTHCOMING POWERFUL EARTHQUAKES

Abstract. Since not any individual precursor can be used as an accurate stand alone means for the earthquake prediction, it is necessary to integrate different kinds of precursors. The precursors selected for analysis in this study include electron and ion density, electron temperature, total electron content (TEC), electric and magnetic fields and land surface temperature (LST) several days before three strong earthquakes which happened in Samoa Islands, Sichuan (China) and Borujerd (Iran). The precursor's variations were monitored using data obtained from experiments onboard DEMETER (IAP, ISL, ICE and IMSC) and Aqua-MODIS satellites. Regarding the ionospheric precursors, the geomagnetic indices D_st and K_p were used to distinguish pre-earthquake disturbed states from the other anomalies related to the geomagnetic activities. The inter-quartile range of data was utilized to construct their upper and lower bound to detect disturbed states outsides the bounds which might be associated with impending earthquakes. When the disturbed state associated with impending earthquake is detected, based on the type of precursor, the number of days relative to earthquake day is estimated. Then regarding the deviation value of the precursor from the undisturbed state the magnitude of impending earthquake is estimated. The radius of the affected area is calculated using the estimated magnitude and Dobrovolsky formula. In order to assess final earthquake parameters (which are date, magnitude and radius of the affected area) for each case study, using the median and inter-quartile range of earthquake parameters obtained from different precursors, the approximate bounds of final earthquake parameters are defined. For each studied case, a good agreement was found between the estimated and registered earthquake parameters.