Re-estimated fault model of the 17th century great earthquake off Hokkaido using tsunami deposit data

- Re-estimation of the fault model of the 17th century great earthquake.
- Very large slip amount at the shallow part of the plate interface.
- Same characteristics of the 17th century and 2011 Tohoku earthquakes.

Paleotsunami researches revealed that a great earthquake occurred off eastern Hokkaido, Japan and generated a large tsunami in the 17th century. Tsunami deposits from this event have been found at far inland from the Pacific coast in eastern Hokkaido. Previous study estimated the fault model of the 17th century great earthquake by comparing locations of lowland tsunami deposits and computed tsunami inundation areas. Tsunami deposits were also traced at high cliff near the coast as high as 18 m above the sea level. Recent paleotsunami study also traced tsunami deposits at other high cliffs along the Pacific coast. The fault model estimated from previous study cannot explain the tsunami deposit data at high cliffs near the coast. In this study, we estimated the fault model of the 17th century great earthquake to explain both lowland widespread tsunami deposit areas and tsunami deposit data at high cliffs near the coast. We found that distributions of lowland tsunami deposits were mainly explained by wide rupture area at the plate interface in Tokachi-Oki segment and Nemuro-Oki segment. Tsunami deposits at high cliff near the coast were mainly explained by very large slip of 25 m at the shallow part of the plate interface near the trench in those segments. The total seismic moment of the 17th century great earthquake was calculated to be 1.7×1022Nm (Mw8.8). The 2011 great Tohoku earthquake ruptured large area off Tohoku and very large slip amount was found at the shallow part of the plate interface near the trench. The 17th century great earthquake had the same characteristics as the 2011 great Tohoku earthquake.