Paleoseismic Evidence for 3-5 Earthquakes on the Southern Willunga Fault, South Australia

Geoscience Australia Data presents preliminary results from a paleoseismic investigation of the southern Willunga Fault. The dataset likely contains evidence for 3-5 ground-rupturing earthquakes since the Middle to Late Pleistocene, with single event displacements of 0.5–1.7 meters. This abstract was presented at the Australian & NZ Geomorphology Group Conference in September 2022.

Use Cases

• Modeling seismic hazard for communities near Adelaide based on the evidence for 3-5 past earthquakes.
• Analyzing long-term tectonic uplift rates in the Mt Lofty Ranges based on the described fault displacement history.
• Correlating paleoseismic event timing with broader landscape evolution in the Myponga and Meadows basins.

Strengths

• Provides evidence for 3-5 specific ground-rupturing paleo-earthquakes.
• Quantifies single-event fault displacements between 0.5 and 1.7 meters.
• Focuses on a specific fault segment ~40 km south of Adelaide, offering localized insights.

Limitations

• Description metadata is limited; actual data quality requires manual inspection after download.
• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.

Provenance

Source

Geoscience Australia Data

Collection Method

Paleoseismic investigation involving trench excavation across the fault to examine fault planes and sedimentary strata.

Time Range

Middle to Late Pleistocene to present.

Freshness

Last updated 2026-04-20 02:14:58.517050; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Southern Willunga Fault, Mt Lofty Ranges, approximately 40 km south of Adelaide, South Australia.