Some Statistical Aspects of Earthquake Occurrence in Iraq

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Abstract
Owing to Iraq's unique geographic location (29-38.5 N;39-49 E) the eastern and northeastern parts of the country are directly influenced by the seismic activity of the Tauros-Zagros tectonic zones. An earthquake data file containing nearly 550 entries covering the period 1905-1984 is compiled and an analysis of completeness is performed using Stepp's (1973) model. It is observed that the file is complete for 4.8 Ms and greater over the whole 80-year sample of data while during the past 25 years this threshold drops to about 4.1 Ms. The “completed” data file is then employed in re-evaluating the magnitude-frequency formula for the country. To further investigate the problem of earthquake occurrence a simple statistical treatment is applied to a “constant-b” seismicity model whereby an increase in the frequency of occurrence of approximately 35% is identified in the latter half of the seismic history of the country.

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