SEISMOTECTONIC HAZARDS ASSESSMENT IN SOUTHWESTERN SINAI AREA USING REMOTE SENSING AND GIS

Omar, Ali E.; Arnous, Mohamed O.; El-Ghawaby, Mohamed A.; Alshami, Abdalla S.; El Zalaky, Mohamed A.

doi:10.21608/sinjas.2016.78664

SEISMOTECTONIC HAZARDS ASSESSMENT IN SOUTHWESTERN SINAI AREA USING REMOTE SENSING AND GIS

Authors

¹ Dept. Geol. and Remote Sensing, Auth. Nucl. Mater., Egypt.

² Dept. Geol., Fac. Sci., Suez Canal Univ., Ismailia, Egypt

³ Dept. Geol., Fac. Sci., Suez Canal Univ., Ismailia, Egypt.

⁴ Dept. Geol. and Remote Sensing, Auth. Nuclear Mater., Egypt.

10.21608/sinjas.2016.78664

Abstract

Major national development projects have been accomplished in Egypt, particularly around the Gulf of Suez - Sinai region. These include construction of national industrial projects, roads, ports, power station, mineral exploration, beach and village's tourist construction. The aim of this study is to assess and map the seismic activity at the southwestern section of Sinai, Egypt. In the present work, remote sensing and Geographic Information System (GIS) techniques are applied using satellite images, topographical, geological and other ancillary geological data. GIS data integration and analysis indicated that the area is threatened to environmental seismotectonic hazard. These depend on the geological, local seismic activity and the structure analyses of data that are extracted from remote sensing and geo-references data. The structural lineaments analysis data extracted from enhanced Landsat 8 (OLI) image showed that major trends of seismic activity is strongly reduced along the segment fault system of the Gulf of Suez and Gulf of Aqaba. The main characteristics of the seismtectonics of the study area are investigated based on the geological data and seismic activity using the recently recorded data by the Egyptian National Seismic Network (ENSN), in the period between 1904-2005. Accordingly, the assessment of the seismic activity hazard was taken into consideration through identification of the sources of events. Almost all of these events (91.75%) were micro earthquakes and about 8.25% had small measurable magnitudes (4.4 > ML >=3.0). The statistical analyses and geospatial mapping are carried out to extracted structural lineaments and seismic activities. The integrated map of the seismotectonic is constructed and showing the distribution sites of the hazards anomalies. The distribution of seismic activity pattern and previously mentioned data analysis for the study area clearly showed the urgent need for an assessment and rehabilitation program to mitigate geo-hazard environmental in existing structures.

Keywords