Earth Observatory of Singapore, Nanyang Technological University, 639798 Singapore, Singapore.
Asian School of the Environment, Nanyang Technological University, 639798 Singapore, Singapore.
Nat Commun. 2017 Jul 19;8:16019. doi: 10.1038/ncomms16019.
The devastating 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami caught millions of coastal residents and the scientific community off-guard. Subsequent research in the Indian Ocean basin has identified prehistoric tsunamis, but the timing and recurrence intervals of such events are uncertain. Here we present an extraordinary 7,400 year stratigraphic sequence of prehistoric tsunami deposits from a coastal cave in Aceh, Indonesia. This record demonstrates that at least 11 prehistoric tsunamis struck the Aceh coast between 7,400 and 2,900 years ago. The average time period between tsunamis is about 450 years with intervals ranging from a long, dormant period of over 2,000 years, to multiple tsunamis within the span of a century. Although there is evidence that the likelihood of another tsunamigenic earthquake in Aceh province is high, these variable recurrence intervals suggest that long dormant periods may follow Sunda megathrust ruptures as large as that of the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami.
2004 年印度洋海啸给数以百万计的沿海居民和科学界带来了巨大的打击。印度洋盆地的后续研究已经确定了史前海啸的存在，但这些事件的时间和复发间隔尚不确定。在这里，我们展示了印度尼西亚亚齐沿海洞穴中一段非凡的 7400 年史前海啸沉积的地层序列。这一记录表明，在 7400 年至 2900 年前，至少有 11 次史前海啸袭击了亚齐海岸。两次海啸之间的平均时间间隔约为 450 年，间隔范围从超过 2000 年的长休眠期到一个世纪内发生多次海啸不等。尽管有证据表明亚齐省再次发生海啸的可能性很高，但这些可变的复发间隔表明，在类似于 2004 年印度洋海啸的巽他海沟大地震之后，可能会出现长时间的休眠期。
