Tsunami Hazard Associated with Makran Subduction Zone along the Southern Coasts of Iran

In this paper the tsunami hazard associated with Makran subduction zone along the southern coasts of Iran is investigated. Several harbors and ports lie in southern coasts of Iran in the vicinity of Indian Ocean. Disruption of operations at these ports due to tsunami waves could impact the national and also regional economies. Therefore, it is necessary to investigate the hazard of tsunami and its possible impacts on coastal structures. The Makran subduction zone is among two main tsunamigenic zones in the Indian Ocean. In this zone the Oman oceanic plate subducts beneath the Iranian Microplate at an estimated rate of about 19 mm/yr. Historically, there is the potential for tsunami generation in this region and several tsunamis attacked the Makran coastlines in the past. The most recent tsunami in this region has occurred on 28 November 1945 which took the lives of more than 4000 people in the coasts of Iran, Pakistan, India, and Oman. Here we examine the seafloor uplift of the Makran zone and its potential for generating destructive tsunamis in the southern coastlines of Iran. Several earthquake scenarios with moment magnitudes ranging between 6.0 and 8.5 are used as initial conditions for analysis. The epicenter of the 1945 event is used as the epicenter for different tsunami scenarios in this study. For each scenario the propagation of tsunami waves on coastlines is calculated, which is the key parameter for tsunami hazard assessment and harbor protection.