Map and Data for Quaternary Faults and Fault Systems on the Island of Hawai‘i

The World Map of Major Active Faults Task Group is compiling a series of digital maps for the United States and other countries in the Western Hemisphere that show the locations, ages, and activity rates of major earthquake-related features such as faults and fault-related folds; the companion database includes published information on these seismogenic features. While the Western Hemisphere effort is sponsored by International Lithosphere Program (ILP) Task Group II-2, the effort to compile a new map and database for the United States is funded by the U.S. Geological Survey’s (USGS) Earthquake Hazards Program (EHP). The maps and accompanying data-bases were key contributions to the Global Seismic Hazards Assessment Program (ILP Task Group II-0) for the International Decade for Natural Disaster Reduction.

This compilation is presented as a digitally prepared map product and catalog of data. The catalog provides referenced data on a variety of Dart3geographic, geologic, and paleoseismologic parameters related to surface faulting. The senior authors (Eric C. Cannon and Roland Bürgmann) compiled the fault data as part of ongoing studies of active faulting on the Island of Hawai‘i.

The primary intention of this compilation is to be used in seismic-hazard evaluations. In regions of low to moderate seismicity, it is particularly important to incorporate geologic information on discrete faults that have evidence of Quaternary movement because the historical record of earthquakes may be too short to identify all hazardous structures. Paleoseismic studies, which evaluate the history of surface faulting or deformation along a given structure, provide a long-term perspective that helps augment the relatively short records of historical seismicity in many regions. In particular, the frequency and location of large-magnitude earthquakes in many parts of the United States are poorly defined by the record of historical seismicity.