Study of directivity effect on electromagnetic emissions in the HF band as earthquake precursors: Preliminary results on field observations

This work focuses on the use of electromagnetic emissions (EM) in the HF band as a warning event for earthquakes. EM at HF components 41 MHz and 46 MHz were monitored and recorded from eight field stations in Greece and correlated with seismological events. Directivity effect raised since EM emissions at specific station locations were correlated to earthquake events from prescribed regions. EM recordings during 1999 were used and by visual inspection were associated to most of the earthquake events greater than 5R. Using these observations a novel algorithm based on the ratio of short term to long term signal average, together with a prediction rules set derived from 1999's EM emissions study were developed to combine results from several field stations. Performance of the system was promising, but was dependent on the geographic area of interest. Overall performance for earthquakes events of magnitude greater than 5.7 R was 75% of seismic events were correctly predicted by EM activity, while 25% were not predicted.