Preliminary empirical scaling of pseudo relative velocity spectra in Serbia from the Vrancea earthquakes

• Frequency dependent attenuation of strong motion from Vrancea earthquakes.
• Extension of Yugoslav scaling equations for PSV Spectra to Vrancea sources.
• Scaling strong motion amplitudes at distances beyond 300 km.
• Tests of empirical PSV Spectra at long and short periods.

First frequency-dependent empirical scaling equations of pseudo-relative velocity spectral amplitudes (PSV) of strong earthquake ground motions in the former Yugoslavia were introduced in the mid-1990s by Lee and Trifunac (1990) [15]. This followed the development of the Fourier spectral amplitudes (FS) scaling equations by Lee and Trifunac (1993) [17] in terms of earthquake source parameters, and the region-specific frequency dependent attenuation function given by Lee and Trifunac (1992) [16]. More recently, a new frequency-dependent attenuation function was developed for central and eastern Serbia for earthquakes of intermediate and large magnitudes and for large epicentral distances—exceeding 300 km—suggested by Lee et al. (2016) [19] that occur in the Vrancea source region in Romania. In this paper we use this frequency-dependent attenuation function to develop empirical scaling equations for PSV spectral amplitudes in Serbia. These scaling equations will form a basis for macro- and micro-zoning earthquake hazard studies in Serbia.