Quantifying P-wave secondary microseisms events: a comparison of observed and modelled backprojection

SUMMARY Secondary microseisms are caused by nonlinear interactions between ocean waves of approximately equal wavelengths and opposite propagation directions. This seismic forcing is evaluated using ocean sea-state hindcast data and further modulated by the bathymetric effect. The numerical ocean model provides a global activity representation of the secondary microseisms, from which we isolate major events. We backprojected teleseismic P-wave propagation into the Earth's mantle to validate these events as effective seismic sources. The ocean model provides spectral amplitude information for modelling microseisms generated seismic wavefield. A comparison of the backprojection for P and PP phases from observed and synthetic microseisms forcing indicates high reliability in the ocean model, at least for major sources. A combination of P and PP phases detected across a global network of stations enables global ocean coverage. We improve backprojection images even further by introducing a two-step stacking for the P phase to address the problem of unbalanced station distribution. Thresholds of microseisms events forces valuable for seismic imaging are determined by comparing backprojections and ocean models for the years 2015 and 2020. Finally, we extracted a catalogue of microseisms events every 3-hr from 1994 to 2020 from the ocean hindcast data set. This catalogue is an intriguing resource for future applications of interferometric imaging at large scale.