Kinematic source models for long-period ground motion simulations of megathrust earthquakes: validation against ground motion data for the 2003 Tokachi-oki earthquake

In this study, a method for simulating the ground motion of megathrust earthquakes at periods of approximately 2 s and longer was validated by using the characterized source model combined with multi-scale spatial heterogeneity. Source models for the MW 8.3, 2003 Tokachi-oki earthquake were constructed, and ground motion simulations were conducted to test their performance. First, a characterized source model was generated based on a source model obtained from waveform inversion analysis. Then, multi-scale heterogeneity was added to the spatial distribution of several source parameters to yield a heterogeneous source model. An investigation of the Fourier spectra and 5 % damped velocity response spectra of the simulated and observed ground motions demonstrated that adding multiscale heterogeneity to the spatial distributions of the slip, rupture velocity, and rake angle of the characterized source model is an effective method for constructing a source model that explains the ground motion at periods of 2-20 s. It was also revealed how the complexity of the parameters affects the resulting ground motion. The complexity of the rupture velocity had the largest influence among the three parameters.