Focal mechanics and disaster characteristics of the 2024 M 7.6 Noto Peninsula Earthquake, Japan

Abstract

On January 1, 2024, a devastating M 7.6 earthquake struck the Noto Peninsula, Ishikawa Prefecture, Japan, resulting in significant casualties and property damage. Utilizing information from the first six days after the earthquake, this article analyzes the seismic source characteristics, disaster situation, and emergency response of this earthquake. The results show: 1) The earthquake rupture was of the thrust type, with aftershock distribution showing a north-east-oriented belt-like feature of 150 km. 2) Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) and Interferometric synthetic aperture radar (InSAR), observations detected significant westward to north-westward co-seismic displacement near the epicenter, with the maximum horizontal displacement reaching 1.2 m and the vertical uplift displacement reaching 4 m. A two-segment fault inversion model fits the observational data well. 3) Near the epicenter, large Peak Ground Velocity (PGV) and Peak Ground Acceleration (PGA) were observed, with the maxima reaching 145 cm/s and 2681 gal, respectively, and the intensity reached the highest level 7 on the Japanese (Japan Meteorological Agency, JMA) intensity standard, which is higher than level 10 of the United States Geological Survey (USGS) Modified Mercalli Intensity (MMI) standard. 4) The observation of the very rare multiple strong pulse-like ground motion (PLGM) waveform poses a topic worthy of research in the field of earthquake engineering. 5) As of January 7, the earthquake had left 128 deaths and 560 injuries in Ishikawa Prefecture, with 1305 buildings completely or partially destroyed, and had triggered a chain of disasters including tsunamis, fires, slope failures, and road damage. Finally, this paper summarizes the emergency rescue, information dissemination, and other disaster response and management measures taken in response to this earthquake. This work provides a reference case for carrying out effective responses, and offers lessons for handling similar events in the future.

Graphical abstract

Keywords

Noto Peninsula Earthquake / earthquake rupture mechanism / earthquake disaster / emergency response / pulse-like ground motion

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Acknowledgements

We appreciate the National Research Institute for Earth Science and Disaster Resilience of Japan (NIED), Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA), Geospatial Information Authority of Japan (GSI), Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism of Japan (MLIT) and Geological Survey of Japan (GSJ) for providing data and reports in the 2024 M 7.6 Noto Peninsula Earthquake. This study was supported by National High-level Innovative Talents Scientific Research Project in Hebei Province, China (No. 405492), JSPS KAKENHI (No. JP19KK0121), and National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 42207224).

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Competing interests

The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

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2024 The Author(s). This article is published with open access at link.springer.com and journal.hep.com.cn