Azerbaijan, Russia to conduct joint seismic studies

By Azernews

By Amina Nazarli

Azerbaijan and Russia will jointly study the seismotectonic features of the Greater Caucasus region.

Gurban Yetirmishli, the head of the Republican Seismological Service Center told Trend that a number of scientific research works will be held jointly with several countries in accordance with the decision of the Presidium of the Azerbaijani National Academy of Sciences.

“Joint research will be conducted with the Institute of Earth Physics of the Russian Academy of Sciences. The works provide for carrying out seismic tomography studies of great depths, studying seismotectonic features of the Southern Slope of the Greater Caucasus, including the identification of foci of earthquakes. The program is for two years and the work will begin in the near future,” he said.

Azerbaijan, located within the central part of the Mediterranean mobile belt, is considered to be a seismically active region – a lot of earthquakes occur over Azerbaijan every year, however, majority of them are not felt.

Epicenter of bulk of the earthquakes, being recorded in Absheron Peninsula and Baku, are located in the Caspian Sea. Overall, Baku represents high seismic hazard and the level increases with the time interval.