Seismic hazard analysis for Izeh city, Khouzestan province

Earthquake is the most destructive geohazard causing substantial economic damages and human losses. Seismic hazard analysis is a practical tool for predicting and reducing seismic risk. This study was carried out a seismic hazard assessment of Izeh city for a 50 km radius. For this purpose, geological setting, and active faults, as well as their geometry in this region were investigated. Besides, the seismic history of the city was assessed. The seismic hazard analysis of the studied area was evaluated using the probabilistic approach in different hazard levels. Ground motion parameters (magnitude and peak ground acceleration) were computed for the 5 to 200-year return period and 10, 37, and 64 % probabilities of exceeding. For return periods of 5 to 200-year, results revealed that the magnitude of the design base earthquake (DBE) ranged from 4.79 to 6.58 Richter. Moreover, the magnitude of the maximum credible earthquake (MCE) varied from 5.89 to 7.69 Richter for the return period. Furthermore, the maximum peak ground acceleration (PGA) of design base earthquake and maximum credible earthquake were calculated 0.25 and 0.48g, respectively, using Campbell's attenuation equation. Furthermore, seismic hazard maps of PGA for the study area were produced for 10 and 64% probabilities of exceedance in the 50-year return period. The resulting seismic hazard maps were classified into low, moderate, high, and very high seismic risk. These maps indicated that about 55.54% (10% probability) and 43.13% (64% probability) of the study area belongs to the very high and high classes, respectively.