Training Archives

4th Annual SLATE Workshop - a virtual experience
@ Home offices across Europe | 24-25/03/2020

This year’s annual SLATE workshop was supposed to take all of us to the mesmerizing city of Barcelona, cradled at the Mediterranean coast of mainland Spain at the foot of the geological playground of the Pyrenees – an ideal setting for an 8-day meeting at the CSIC full of science, field trips and socializing at the end of March! Enters COVID-19 and with it the measures of social distancing to slow down the contagion…

After the initial shock and numbness as to the worldwide impact of the pandemic, we faced two options:

Cancelling the entire workshop with the prospect of a potential rescheduling later this year
Making use of the technological merit of video conferencing to at least maintain a part of the scheduled meeting

So we went with the latter option and organized a 2-day “virtual” meeting, which proved to be a most welcome distraction from the daily bad news currently flooding all our lives. Up to 33 participants joined this improvised workshop, fully armed with webcams and microphones.

In spite of the truly difficult circumstances, the ESRs provided excellent talks outlining their most recent findings and clearly demonstrated their personal development to self-reliant researchers in the subsequent discussions. The following supervisory board meeting assessed the impact of the current situation on the progress of individual projects (e.g., restrictions regarding access to facilities or cancelled secondments) and discussed potential countermeasures (e.g., virtual training measures).

Finally, we closed our first online workshop with a “virtual” clink of glasses and merry chatting, all from the comfort of our homes.

Downloads

Workshop schedule

Impressions

My Secondment in Barcelona
Thomas Zengaffinen (ESR13) | @ ICM-CSIC Barcelona (1 February - 15 March 2020)

The last chapter of my PhD deals with the baseline for a probabilistic tsunami hazard analysis in the Gulf of Cadiz. A PTHA study reflects all possible events rather than only a worst-case scenario as it was done in the past. The tsunami sources are submarine landslides. In my previous chapters, I investigated the interaction between the landslide’s failure mechanics and wave generation in idealised settings and also in real events. This knowledge will help to conduct this last chapter.

The probabilistic framework involves parameter uncertainties. Geotechnical parameters like yield strength, its softening rate, and drag coefficients can be estimated from previous landslide modelling such as the Storegga Slide or the Grand Banks slump and landslide. However, these sediments had been glaciated, while the sediments in the Gulf of Cadiz were not. Therefore we will calibrate geotechnical parameters using the volume to runout ratio relationship from the landslide catalogue of the Gulf of Cadiz. This landslide catalogue is been developed by ESR14 student, William Meservy.

The volume to runout ratio relationship is far from a perfect fit. A possible reason for this is the involvement of all different landslides with different geometrical representations, be it the initial landslide shape or sea floor shape where the landslide evolved. This makes it a challenge to calibrate our geotechnical model parameters. A way to tackle this problem is to analyse the type of landslide and its initial shape. This information can be retrieved from the landslide catalogue. Altogether, this work is an important basis for a PTHA in the Gulf of Cadiz.

Apart from science, I was curious to learn about Catalan culture. ESR students, Davide Mencaroni, Johnny Ford, William Meservy, Stefano Collico, other friendly colleagues from the Institute of Marine Sciences ICM, and my two flatmates, Ana Leblanc and Ramon Bascompte, introduced me into the Catalan culture. Thank you for these great times. Unfortunately, around midtime of my secondment, we got limited to exploit the Catalan culture and even working at the institute due to the tragic worldwide Covid-19 outbreak. Thus, with the agreement with my supervisors and the project leader, I paused my secondment and flew back home straight into a two-week quarantine.

Location

ICM – CSIC Barcelona, ESP

Impressions

Ricarda's Recap of 2019
Ricarda Gatter (ESR9)

Many great things happened in 2019.Some highlights for me included the EGU General Assembly (Impressions from EGU); the METEOR M154/2 cruise to research volcanic deposits surrounding Montserrat; secondments and visits to the National Oceanography Centre (NOCS), the University of Southampton and Fugro; the annual SLATE workshop in Bologna (3rd Annual SLATE Workshop); and, of course, my first paper submission. Now that the final year of my PhD and the pressure to finish has begun, I am looking back on some of these events; happy and proud of how far I have already come.

Montserrat, here we come!

One of the most exciting things for me was probably being part of the METEOR M154/2 research cruise to Montserrat. It was my first time on a research vessel and I really loved it. It was amazing to be surrounded by science 24/7, and to see the excitement glittering in everyone’s eyes whenever we arrived at a new coring site and recovered even the smallest amounts of material. One of my favourite memories is that of a senior scientist jumping around, shouting “It worked, it really worked! I never build anything that works!” after their new developments were successfully deployed. I enjoyed meeting people from different scientific backgrounds and talking to them about their research and my own project. The work on the ship really helped me to get a better understanding of my own data, and to develop new ideas. Of course, we also had a little helper on board…

Junior scientist learning the craft

Correct labelling of the core is crucial

Core description, using the Munsell Colour Chart

Southampton

Another big event was my secondment in Southampton. For two months, I went back and forth between the National Oceanography Centre and the University of Southampton, working relentlessly on my micro-CT data and my first manuscript. Thanks to the great supervision of Mike Clare (NOCS) and Madhusudhan Murthy (University of Southampton), not only did I make considerable progress on the segmentation of my micro-CT images, I also finished my first paper ‘A multi-disciplinary investigation of the AFEN Slide’. During my stay, we also visited Fugro GB Marine Limited. The people were extremely friendly and after a tour through the labs I had the opportunity to present and discuss my work with scientists from Fugro.

By the way, if you have ever wondered what micro-CT actually is:

Micro-CT (otherwise known as “micro computed tomography”) is a 3D imaging technique, which allows the visualisation of the internal structure of objects at a micro scale, and non-destructively. The applied method is the same as that used in hospital CT scans, but on a much smaller scale and with significantly increased resolution.

One thing I have been realising over the past year is that more and more people tend to ask what my plans for the future are. However, truthfully, there are so many interesting things happening right at this moment that I would rather stay in the present a bit longer, rather than worry about the future.

„So, what do you plan to do after finishing your PhD?” – I PLAN TO FINISH IT!

Where?

When?

July – September 2019

Supervision

Mike Clare (NOCS)
Madhusudhan B N Murthy (University of Southampton)

Ting-Wei's secondments @NGI and IFREMER (second term)
TING-WEI WU (ESR7) | @ NGI Oslo, Norway (August 2019); IFREMER BREST, FRANCE (November-December 2019)

In August 2019, I went back to NGI the second time to complete my triaxial test series on Ottawa Sand to study about seismic strengthening. I used a machine called the Advanced Dynamic Triaxial Testing System (DYNTTS) from the GDS company. The goal was to quantify the increase of undrained shear strength caused by reconsolidation after earthquake events without failure. First, I simulated small earthquakes by undrained cyclic loading. Then, I drained the excess pore pressure, and conducted monotonic loading tests to determine the undrained shear strength (also known as “static triaxial compression test”).

As I got more skilled and experienced, these tests went exceptionally well. I discovered that the change of undrained shear strength due to earthquakes’ impact is highly complex, and is probably affected by the non-homogeneity induced by seismic shaking on the sample. Besides completing my monotonic strengthening series, I even opened up another paper topic about cyclic strengthening – that is to say, to determine the decrease of re-liquefaction potential of a specimen that had been subjected to prior seismic shaking without failure. These tests were done by undrained cyclic loading (also known as “dynamic triaxial tests”).

Thanks to SLATE that provided me with the network, I could also link this study with a collaboration with IFREMER. I went back to IFREMER for the second time (November and December 2019) to compare my NGI cyclic shear strength measurements with further test series using a IFREMER machine. The machine at IFREMER is called the Enterprise Level Dynamic Triaxial Testing System (ELDYN) also from the GDS company. It is different from the machine in NGI in terms of the sample dimension, cell pressure controller, and the absence of adaptive stiffness estimate of the cyclic loading term. Repetition tests with these two machines turned out to be very difficult, despite the fact the I was the same operator and used the same sample preparation method. After a lot of efforts, I eventually conducted comparable results with two different machines with a new proposed calculation method of cyclic shear stress ratio (CSR). I also conducted additional grain size measurements and microscope imaging to investigate if the material’s frictional properties and shear strength may change a lot by grain abrasion.

Before the end of my IFREMER term, I finished writing my first paper about triaxial tests (Effect of Seismic Shaking on the Monotonic Shear Strength of Sand Without Prior Failure) to Soils Dynamics and Earthquake Engineering, and another paper about considerations of using triaxial tests to assess re-liquefaction potential of sand will come soon in the future.

My research on Ottawa Sand would not have been possible without the technical support and suggestions of improvement from many engineers, in particular from Yusuke Suzuki and Brian Carlton at NGI, and Nabil Sultan and Sebastien Garziglia at IFREMER. I also thank Carl Harbitz and Antonio Cattaneo for organizing my stays at these institutes.

For me, the secondments were absolutely very enjoyable in both places. I not only learned many technics but also received welcoming support from many people (both physically and mentally). Finally, it was a surprise that many SLATE students were at IFREMER at the same period! Thanks to Shray, Tugdual and Maarten, I had the chance to drink from a porró (Spanish glass wine pitcher) but poured some Sangria into my nose! It was a failure, but smelled good. Likewise, I met many troubles during my experiments and had to change my plans because of technical difficulties. But I believe that all these hard works will eventually pay off in the future. Thank you all for being there for me on my way of transformation from a geophysicist into a geotechnical engineer!

Locations

Norwegian Geotechnical Institute, Oslo, Norway

Ifremer , Center of Brest/Plouzané, France

Contributors

SLATE coordinators:

Carl Harbitz
Antonio Cattaneo

Co-supervisors:

Yusuke Suzuki
Brian Carlton
Nabil Sultan
Sebastien Garziglia

Maarten's secondment at the University of Innsbruck, Austria
Maarten Heijnen (ESR10) | @ Innsbruck, Austria (June - August 2018)

Wow! As soon as the airplane descended through the clouds there were mountains everywhere! This was a great start to my nine-weeks secondment at Innsbruck University. The scenery was so impressive that I was taking pictures as soon as I got out of the airplane, before walking into the arrivals hall at Innsbruck airport. After picking up my bags, I went to Maddalena’s house (ESR 15) who was on secondment in Bremen for the time I would be in Innsbruck, so that worked very well out logistically. Less socially. It was Saturday, after a day of settling in, experiencing the high supermarket prices, and exploring the old town of Innsbruck, my secondment could start on Monday morning.

I would spend my time in Innsbruck working on sediment cores retrieved from Millstaettersee, an Alpine lake in Carinthia, eastern Austria. These cores were to contain a very well preserved and detailed record of lake sediments, including different types of suspended sediment clouds flowing over the bottom of the lake. These flows are called turbidity currents and can be caused by submarine landslides, but also by other events, like river floods. The rest of my project also evolves around these flows, but than in fjords. The scientific purpose of this secondment is to see how these flow events are actually preserved on the bottom of a basin, which is currently not possible in the fjords, since we do not have good sediment cores in the main part of were the flows deposit their sediment (lobes). Furthermore, I would learn how to work with sediment cores, and how to analyse data obtained from them. Lastly, the secondment offered the opportunity to compare lacustrine settings with fjord settings. Prof. Michael Strasser (PI of ESR 15) and Dr. Jasper Moernaut hosted and supervised me during the secondment.

Unfortunately, the cores were collected well before I arrived in Innsbruck, so no fieldwork on an Alpine lake for me this time. Apart from the coring itself, I was involved in the complete process of working with sediment cores, which I had little experience with. Christoph Daxer, a PhD student in Innsbruck, showed me how to split cores, log them, measure their physical properties, and measure their chemistry (with the help of Steven Huang). I also learned how to take small samples from these cores and study their composition under the microscope, and measure the size of the sediment grains the cores are composed of (with the help of Marcel Ortler). One of the highlights was the beauty of these lacustrustrine cores, which have a fine layering in them that is caused by seasonal variations in the lake in them. These are called varves, and allow accurate dating of sediment, just like year rings in a tree. Another highlight was realising how much of the sediment in these cores was made up by microfossils called diatoms, they were a delight to study under the microscope. The variety in the shapes of diatoms and the networks they sometimes form is awesome! Also having the opportunity to work with the ITRAX XRF scanner was great. These machines blast X-Rays into the core, and can give data on the elemental composition of the sediment based on what rays they release back, at stunning resolutions (we used a resolution of 200 µm).

Apart from the science, I had enjoyed working in the group in Innsbruck. Being able to work with people outside of my own research group really expanded my perspective. I shared an office with other PhD students and MSc students from the group. I had various so called “Millstaetter meetings”, and we had group coffee every Monday where we discussed everything that was going on in the group. The planning of my secondment was especially good, as my second day happened to be the group’s yearly hike and barbecue. This was a great way to get to know the group and it made me feel very welcome!

Lastly, living in Innsbruck for a summer, was a great experience! I could work on my German, which got a bit rusty over the years. I enjoyed plenty of local specialities including schnitzels, strudels, apperol spritz, kaspressknödelsuppe, and much more. But the best thing of all was being in the mountains for the entire summer, which is very unusual for a Dutch person. I went hiking at least once a week. Especially so called “hiking club” that my Innsbruck colleague Jana initiated with me, was awesome!

Thanks for an amazing secondment Michi, Jasper, Steven, Christoph, Jana, Andrea, Domi, Patrick, Tobias, and Marcel!

Servus!

Location

Innsbruck, Austria

SLATE AT THE 2019 EUROPEAN RESEARCHERS' NIGHT
RACHEL BARRETT (ESR1), TUGDUAL GAUCHERY (ESR3) | @ ECKERNFÖRDE (GERMANY) and BOLOGNA (ITALY) (27 September 2019)

SLATE at the European Researchers’ Night in Eckernförde, Germany

Rachel Barrett ESR 1

The European Researchers’ Night is an annual event that occurs simultaneously in multiple European cities, and gives researchers the opportunity to present their work to the public. Researchers can use a variety of mediums to present their work – and their enthusiasm for science – to the public. In Eckernförde (Northern Germany), where Rachel Barrett (ESR1) presented her work, there were, amongst others: lectures; posters; interactive science experiments; short films; a livestream from the international space station; a musical accompaniment to parts of the Blue Planet BBC documentary; an open ship (the German Research Vessel Littorina); and an “innovation truck” (highlighting work from local start-ups).

I (Rachel) presented a poster that addressed my recent work on the volcanic-flank collapse of Fogo Island in the Cape Verdes, as well as the broader implications of work on submarine landslides (i.e. hazard analysis). I shared a tent with a couple of researchers from GEOMAR Kiel who also work on submarine landslides and hazard analysis/mitigation, and the collaboration was very successful. I also did a short presentation about my research (and why I am a scientist/what makes me excited about science) during a transition between short films that were shown on a big outdoors screen. I was impressed at the high level of public engagement at the event – during the six hours we were there, there were seldom a few minutes where we were not discussing our research (and science in general) with members of the public, both young and old, and people were engaged and interested. I really enjoyed being able to present my work at the European Researchers’ Night in Eckernförde, and look forward to being involved again next year.

Location

Eckernförde, Schleswig-Holstein, Germany

Impressions

With GEOMAR researchers (Laura and Anna) in our combined tent

Giving a short impromptu speech about why I am a scientist and what I research (Photo: L. Gomez)

Giving a short impromptu speech about why I am a scientist and what I research (Photo: N. Linke)

R/V Littorina Open-Ship at the European Researchers' Night (Photo: N. Linke)

SLATE at the European Researchers’ Night in Bologna, Italy

Tugdual Gauchery ESR 3

This was the first year I (Tugdual) did outreach at the European Researchers’ Night, and I participated in Bologna. I went with colleagues from my research group to present the work done at ISMAR (CNR) on microfossils, geochemistry, deep-water corals and sedimentology. I used this opportunity to show my work with multi-channel seismic profiles, explain how and why we acquire these data, and how (coupled with other proxies) we can reconstruct the history of a sedimentary basin.

Within a project funded by the Marie Sklodowska-Curie Actions, I had the chance to participate at the stand along with fellow Marie-Curie-funded researchers from Bologna. They asked us to bring a mysterious object related to our work and leave it on the table. To enhance curiosity, the game was to let the public pick a profile on the table (with a picture of us and key words related to our work) and correlate it with the mystery object. Once they succeeded, we could engage in conversation to explain our work in more detail and discuss what the object is. For this occasion, I brought a core catcher and once they guessed what it was, I explained the use of the core together with seismics (with images) to identify gravity-driven flows (explained with sketch), which represents a hazards for coastal cities and offshore infrastructures.

Overall, this was a fantastic experience to explain my work to the public and bring/reinforce an interest in science, especially for young people. I was very surprised by the number of young people who came to the stand and were interested in our work. It was challenging to explain my work in a simple and interesting way, especially in Italian, but it was very useful and enjoyable. Thank you!

Location

Bologna, Italy

Impressions

Tugdual's profile for the event in Bologna

ISMAR-CNR research group participating in the European Researchers' Night 2019

Presentation of the use of a core in marine geology to the public

Marie Sklodowska-Curie Actions fellows participating in the European Researchers' Night 2019

3rd Annual SLATE Workshop
@ ISMAR Bologna, Italy | 15-21/9/2019

The 3rd annual SLATE workshop was organised from 15 – 21 September 2019 at ISMAR (Institute of Marine Sciences) in Bologna, which is part of the Italian National Research Council (CNR). Located in the direct vicinity of the Northern Apennine Mountains, it provided the perfect setting for this year’s focus:

post-failure mechanisms of submarine mass transports
& their expression within the internal structures of resulting deposits

To provide a hands-on training experience for the participating ESRs (as well as interested students and colleagues), the workshop was combined with a 2-day field trip to handpicked outcrops in the area.

The workshop took off on Sunday, 15 September, with a full-day expert course on scientific writing given by project beneficiary Mike Clare (NOC Southampton), who tailored the course specifically to the needs of the ESRs, as these currently are in the process of preparing their first manuscripts.

This was followed by a 2-day core workshop including:
Presentations by ESRs introducing and discussing their preliminary research results to all participating beneficiaries, partners and interested guests;
A dedicated poster session for in-depth discussions on the ESRs work;
semi-annual Personal Training and Career Development Committee (PCDP) meetings with main and co-supervisors;
presentations by new project partners from MIGRIS AS and VBPR AS (both Norway);
Key-note lectures on the workshop topic with contributions from Gian-Andrea Pini (University of Trieste), Kei Ogata (Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam) and Angelo Camerlenghi (OGS Trieste);
A supervisory board meeting to discuss upcoming events and plan for the next annual workshop

Wednesday, 18 September, was dedicated to the technical workshop training ESRs both theoretically and practically in a variety of aspects regarding the identification of structures inside fossil mass transport complexes and deposits. It was followed by a 2-day field trip to the Northern Apennines to apply the newly acquired skills and gain practical experience.

A second expert course was organised on the last day of the workshop, 21 September. Dr. Andrea Brunello from the Jet Propulsion Theatre gave a science dramaturgy course entitled “Creating an exiting story taking inspiration from science”, which aimed at teaching the participants fundamental elements for the creation of dramaturgic history that draws inspiration from scientific content.

Location

ISMAR, Bologna, Italy

Downloads

Workshop schedule

Public lecture

Tuesday, 17 September, 2 pm
“Statistical models for the evaluation of landslide hazard. Terrestrial and extra-terrestrial cases”
Dr. Maria Teresa Brunetti
(IRPI CNR, Perugia)

Expert courses

Scientific writing
Dr. Michael A. Clare
(NOC Southampton)
Science dramaturgy: creating an exciting story taking inspiration from science
Dr. Andrea Brunello
(Jet Propulsion Theatre)

Technical workshop

field evidence and internal structure of mass transport deposits
Gian-Andrea Pini
(University of Trieste)

Maddalena’s 3-month secondment at Marum, Bremen
maddalena sammartini (ESR15) | @ marum bremen, germany (june - august 2019)

One year after my short visit to MARUM (see previous report), I returned back to Bremen, this time for a three-month secondment. After opening some Lake Lucerne cores in Innsbruck, and performing on them the basic tests, such as water content, fall cone test, vane shear, granulometry analysis, and Atterberg limits, I moved (with my cores) to Bremen for a more advanced geotechnical analysis.
Between June and August I dealt with oedometric tests, pycnometer measures and ring shear tests, with the main aim of characterizing both basin and slope sediments in Zinnen and Kastanienbaum area.

Oedometric test: used for measuring the sediment’s consolidation status and compressibility properties. An undisturbed sample of sediment is put inside the consolidation cell, and subjected to increments of effective vertical stress. Each application last for 24h and the vertical displacement of the sample is measured in time. The load is doubled at each increment. After reaching the maximum load needed, the sample is subjected to an unloading phase, during which the swelling properties of the sediment are recorded.
For my tests, I applied the following effective vertical stresses: 2.5, 5, 10, 20, 40, 80, 160, 320 kPa. For the unloading phase: 80, 20, 5 kPa. Each test lasted for 11 days.

Pycnometer test: used for measuring the solid density. After measuring the water content, the dry sample is put in a beaker of known density and then inside the machine, which calculates, in few minutes, the density of the solid.
This device has been very useful for my oedometric test analysis. Knowing the density of the solid, and the initial and final water content of the sample, it is possible to express the vertical displacement at each loading step in terms of void ratio change.

Ring shear test: used for measuring the residual shear strength of soil. A remolded sample of sediment is put inside the ring shear apparatus. The soil, subjected to different vertical stresses, is sheared by rotating the bottom of the ring shear apparatus until it reaches 3 mm of displacement. The shearing velocity is constant during the test, and it has to be carefully selected, based on the kind of sediment, in order to avoid the formation of excess pore pressure.
For my tests I used a shearing velocity of 0.033 µm/s and the following vertical stresses: 2, 5, 10, 17, 32, 64, 125, and 247 kPa. Each test lasted for 19 days.

The biggest challenge during my stay at MARUM, has been recreating, in laboratory, the in situ conditions of my sediments. These geotechnical devices are built to work with the high vertical stresses of marine investigations, with lever arm that multiplies x5 or x10 the weight you put. In my case, I work on superficial lake sediments, which are subjected to an in situ vertical stress of ~2-5 kPa. Therefore, I had to start all my tests with the minimum weight allowed (0.1 kg). With this low weight, the machines are very sensible and just an accidental hit to the working table can ruin the measure and therefore the entire test.
After a first month spent in getting familiar with the all the devices and the technics, and in performing some empty tests for measuring the “machine noise”, I was able to perform 11 oedometric tests and 4 ring shear tests.

Thanks to this secondment in Bremen I was not only able to get more interesting data for my Lake Lucerne investigation, but also I developed geotechnical skills, which could be very useful for future career.

Location

MARUM Bremen, Germany

"921 (Chi-Chi) Earthquake" 20th anniversary special topic
Ting-Wei WU (ESR7)

The “921 Earthquake” has its 20^th anniversary this year (2019). The 921 Earthquake, also known as Jiji (Chi-Chi) Earthquake, was a 7.3 M_L or 7.6–7.7 M_w earthquake which occurred in Jiji, Nantou County, Taiwan on Tuesday, 21 September 1999 at 01:47:12 local time, killing 2415 people.

Artist “不會冷”, who was also my classmate in the Department of Earth Sciences, National Central University, Taiwan, made a video review on how the pain of this event has turned into the energy of Taiwan’s progress and advancement in the past 20 years. I have obtained the author’s consent to translate part of his video to be presented in this post.

There are many large earthquakes in Taiwan, and the 921 Earthquake was not the most serious one. The 1935 Hsinchu-Taichung Earthquake (also called: Shinchiku-Taichū Earthquake, as it happened in the period when Taiwan was under Japanese rule) was the deadliest earthquake in Taiwan’s recorded history, claiming 3276 lives and causing extensive damage. Civil aid organizations were established, and earthquake preparedness drills also began to appear from this time in Taiwan.

The pain of the 921 Earthquake has turned into the pace of change

How about the 921 Earthquake in 1999? Because it happened more recently than the 1935 Hsinchu-Taichung Earthquake, the new changes have had a higher impact on us.

I. Differences in the earthquake-resistance of houses after generations

Because the ground acceleration generated at that time exceeded the maximum value of the building code that year, the 921 Earthquake prompted the modification of many relevant regulations:

1999 Earthquake happened, and the building regulations were revised

2002 New laws were amended

2003 If houses obtained construction licenses after 2003, they had to be constructed in a more earthquake-resistant way.

2006 The building regulations have taken the next step by taking into account the impact factors of faults and geological settings.

II. Search and rescue dogs

When the 921 Earthquake happened, many international search and rescue teams from 20 countries came to Taiwan to help, including more than 100 rescue dogs. At that time, Taiwan did not have its own rescue dogs. Therefore, after seeing the ability of international rescue dogs, the Fire Agency of Taiwan was eager to train Taiwan’s own rescue dogs as well.

Taiwan’s search and rescue dog team was successfully established in 2010, and had carried out missions not only in Taiwan, but also in countries such as Iran, Indonesia and Haiti. Nowadays, more than half of Asia’s UN-certified search and rescue dogs are from Taiwan.

III. Seismic intensity scales

When the 921 Earthquake took place, Taiwan’s seismic intensity scale only had levels from 0 (<0.8 gal) to 6 (>250 gal). However, strong-motion stations from the Central Weather Bureau of Taiwan recorded peak ground acceleration of more than 980 gal in the 921 Earthquake event. Therefore, the Central Weather Bureau invited earthquake experts and scholars to discuss whether it would be better to add a new level in the seismic intensity scale. Finally, the seventh level was added with 400 gal, which is a new specification only available after the 921 Earthquake event.

IV. Research achievements

The Central Weather Bureau established the Seismological Center in 1989, and began to set up a large number of strong-motion stations. 10 years later, the 921 Earthquake recorded unprecedented near-fault strong earthquake signals. These records have contributed greatly to the development of earthquake science, including many papers published on Nature and Science.

During the 921 Earthquake, the observation network in Taiwan only took 102 seconds to determine the epicenter, whereas the fastest foreign networks still needed 10 – 20 minutes. In October that year, the US Department of State specially called for the chief scientist of the US Geological Survey to go to the Congress to explain the outstanding achievements of Taiwan.

Location

Jiji (Chi-Chi) Township, Nantou County, Taiwan

My First Secondment in Durham, including a visit to the british geological survey
Thomas Zengaffinen (ESR13) | @ Durham University, United Kingdom (1 May - 1 August 2019)

The third chapter of my PhD is modelling the Trænadjupet Slide and its resulting tsunami. The landslide is one of the largest submarine landslides that happened worldwide at ~3000yr BP off the western Norwegian coast, though there is no evidence of tsunami deposits in coastal lakes. Through numerical modelling, I intend to find out how the failure dynamics of the Trænadjupet Slide governed the lack of tsunami generation.

Between May and August 2019 I began my first secondment at Durham University, collecting data for my initial model setup and an explanation for its failure dynamics.

Joshua Allin is the first author of a currently revised scientific paper that deals with geological evidence associated with failure dynamics. Three of many co-authors are Peter Talling, David Tappin, and Edward Pope. Peter Talling and Edward Pope are both based at Durham University, with Peter Talling supervising me during my secondment, and Edward Pope providing me with the bathymetric data of the landslide. David Tappin works in Keyworth at the British Geological Survey (BGS) and is currently carving out supporting arguments on the failure dynamics.

Discussions with Peter Talling about the geological setting and possible failure dynamics served as a good start. After a month in Durham at the beginning of June 2019, I visited David Tappin in Keyworth for two days, where we discussed possible scenarios of the slide failure dynamics by looking at 3D-Multibeam data. He shared his recent findings and analysis so that together with my modelling skills gained in Oslo, I was able to explain to him how we intended to set up the numerical model of the landslide.

During the SLATE midterm meeting in Bremen at the beginning of July 2019, Finn Løvholt, one of my supervisors in Oslo, Peter Talling and I took the opportunity to discuss the progress of my Trænadjupet chapter. We also talked about my second chapter, modelling the 2018 Anak Krakatoa flank collapse and tsunami.

During my stay in Durham, I regularly discussed the findings from the 2018 Anak Krakatoa event with my supervisors Finn Løvholt and Carl Harbitz from NGI, and with Geir Pedersen from the University of Oslo. They advised me on the further steps needed to finish my simulations, analysis, and writing of this second chapter. By the end of my secondment, I had come up with a first paper draft on which Peter Talling gave me fruitful comments concerning the writing.

Apart from science, I socialised with my office mates who were seated in the same open-plan office as me in the department of Earth Sciences. After work hours, we spent time together socially. There were several other musicians in the department, and we met weekly for jam sessions. Many students lived in the same part of town as I did, including Kate Heerema, ESR 5, who came back from Oslo in the last week of my secondment in Durham. As a passionate long sprint runner, I joined the running team ‘The City Harriers’ and had the chance to train with national champions as well as other decent runners.

All in all, my secondment at Durham University was a great opportunity to collaborate and socialise with other great researchers. The bathymetry data provided by Edward Pope, and taking Peter Talling and David Tappin’s geological explanations of the failure dynamics into account has been invaluable in the progression of my project. Furthering our geological understanding has made our numerical models much more realistic, so for this, I am very grateful.

Location

Durham University, UK

Impressions

4th Annual SLATE Workshop - a virtual experience @ Home offices across Europe | 24-25/03/2020

My Secondment in Barcelona Thomas Zengaffinen (ESR13) | @ ICM-CSIC Barcelona (1 February - 15 March 2020)

Ricarda's Recap of 2019 Ricarda Gatter (ESR9)

Ting-Wei's secondments @NGI and IFREMER (second term) TING-WEI WU (ESR7) | @ NGI Oslo, Norway (August 2019); IFREMER BREST, FRANCE (November-December 2019)

Maarten's secondment at the University of Innsbruck, Austria Maarten Heijnen (ESR10) | @ Innsbruck, Austria (June - August 2018)

SLATE AT THE 2019 EUROPEAN RESEARCHERS' NIGHT RACHEL BARRETT (ESR1), TUGDUAL GAUCHERY (ESR3) | @ ECKERNFÖRDE (GERMANY) and BOLOGNA (ITALY) (27 September 2019)

3rd Annual SLATE Workshop @ ISMAR Bologna, Italy | 15-21/9/2019

Maddalena’s 3-month secondment at Marum, Bremen maddalena sammartini (ESR15) | @ marum bremen, germany (june - august 2019)

"921 (Chi-Chi) Earthquake" 20th anniversary special topic Ting-Wei WU (ESR7)

My First Secondment in Durham, including a visit to the british geological survey Thomas Zengaffinen (ESR13) | @ Durham University, United Kingdom (1 May - 1 August 2019)

4th Annual SLATE Workshop - a virtual experience
@ Home offices across Europe | 24-25/03/2020

My Secondment in Barcelona
Thomas Zengaffinen (ESR13) | @ ICM-CSIC Barcelona (1 February - 15 March 2020)

Ricarda's Recap of 2019
Ricarda Gatter (ESR9)

Ting-Wei's secondments @NGI and IFREMER (second term)
TING-WEI WU (ESR7) | @ NGI Oslo, Norway (August 2019); IFREMER BREST, FRANCE (November-December 2019)

Maarten's secondment at the University of Innsbruck, Austria
Maarten Heijnen (ESR10) | @ Innsbruck, Austria (June - August 2018)

SLATE AT THE 2019 EUROPEAN RESEARCHERS' NIGHT
RACHEL BARRETT (ESR1), TUGDUAL GAUCHERY (ESR3) | @ ECKERNFÖRDE (GERMANY) and BOLOGNA (ITALY) (27 September 2019)

3rd Annual SLATE Workshop
@ ISMAR Bologna, Italy | 15-21/9/2019

Maddalena’s 3-month secondment at Marum, Bremen
maddalena sammartini (ESR15) | @ marum bremen, germany (june - august 2019)

"921 (Chi-Chi) Earthquake" 20th anniversary special topic
Ting-Wei WU (ESR7)

My First Secondment in Durham, including a visit to the british geological survey
Thomas Zengaffinen (ESR13) | @ Durham University, United Kingdom (1 May - 1 August 2019)