Tsunami modelling

Since the beginning of my PhD, I have developed new - and improved existing – numerical code for simulation of tsunami propagation. During the PhD and Master degrees, I attended training in numerical development and applications of High Performance Computing and applied those skills during my PhD and Postdoctoral appointments. During my Postdoc at ANU, I developed an innovative method to simulate tsunamis by integrating into the basic shallow water equations – equations on which every tsunami code available are based – the interaction of the tsunami with the ocean floor in terms of deformations due to the excess water load. This innovative new method (Allgeyer & Cummins, GRL, 2014) solves the known problem of discrepancies between the tsunami wave speed in numerical simulations and in reality (frequency dependent differences of up to 2%, i.e. up to 20 minutes for a trans-oceanic tsunami). This work won me a visiting fellowship to the University of Chile, and to the Earthquake Research Institute, University of Tokyo. This method is now being implemented in the numerical code of the Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology (Baba et al, Ocean Modelling, 2017).

Comparison between observation (black) and modeling (green prior to this study, red after) of the 2010 Maule tsunami observed near Hawaii

Publications

Allgeyer, Sébastien, and Phil Cummins. “Numerical tsunami simulation including elastic loading and seawater density stratification.” Geophysical Research Letters 41, no. 7 (2014): 2368-2375. [LINK]

Baba, Toshitaka, Sebastien Allgeyer, Jakir Hossen, Phil R. Cummins, Hiroaki Tsushima, Kentaro Imai, Kei Yamashita, and Toshihiro Kato. “Accurate numerical simulation of the far-field tsunami caused by the 2011 Tohoku earthquake, including the effects of Boussinesq dispersion, seawater density stratification, elastic loading, and gravitational potential change.” Ocean Modelling 111 (2017): 46-54. [LINK]