Speaker
Description
Armenia is located in one of the most seismically active regions of the Alpine–Himalayan seismic belt and has experienced several destructive earthquakes, including the catastrophic 1988 event that caused severe human and economic losses. Despite the above and significant advances in seismic monitoring and hazard assessment, the country still lacks an operational earthquake early warning system (EEWS) capable of providing rapid alerts to critical infrastructure and the population.
This study presents a comprehensive conceptual design and feasibility analysis of a territorial integrated Earthquake Early Warning System tailored for the seismotectonic conditions and infrastructural characteristics of Armenia. The research aims to assess the suitability and adaptability of existing EEWS concepts and algorithms for Armenian conditions, and to develop a scientifically justified and systemized quantitative and qualitative requirements on proposed Armenian national territorial integrated EEWS and its architecture and EEW algorithms capable of providing timely early alerts for densely populated urban areas and critically important infrastructural and other objects.
The study analyzes the seismotectonic framework of Armenia, major seismic sources, historical earthquake impacts, and spatial relationships between hazardous faults and high-risk target areas. A comparative evaluation of existing EEW Systems and EEW methodologies—including on-site, regional, hybrid, and ML/AI-based algorithms—is performed in order to identify the most suitable approaches for implementation in Armenia.
Based on these analyses, the paper proposes scientifically justified quantitative and qualitative requirements for the technical, operational, and maintenance characteristics of the Proposed Armenian EEWS, including requirements for its conceptual architecture, optimal EEW algorithms, configurations of seismic networks, real-time data processing systems, magnitude estimation accuracy, and warning dissemination mechanisms. Special attention is given to the requirements enabling the effective protection of critically important objects and early warning for urban population centers.