ESARSWG - Eastern and Southern Africa Regional Seismological Working Group

The ESARSWG network has nodes in nine countries along the East African Rift:

• Eritrea
• Ethiopia
• Kenya
• Malawi
• Mozambique
• Tanzania
• Uganda
• Zambia
• Zimbabwe

The ISP supported groups at University of Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, University of Nairobi, Kenya and National University of Science and Technology, Zimbabwe are members of the network, as well as the formerly ISP supported group at University of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.

The network is coordinated by a steering committee headed by Dr Fred Tugume, Uganda Geological Survey in Entebbe, Uganda. In addition, ten staff members from the eight other participating institutions are members of the steering committee.

ISP support started in 1997.

Objectives

The East Africa rift system forms the most recognized rifting world-wide and a number of damaging earthquakes have occurred in the region. It is therefore imperative to monitor the seismic activities of the East Africa Rift system within the Eastern and Southern Africa Region for an understanding of the processes leading to the earthquakes in the region, and for mitigating the effects of the earthquakes. The network aims to:

• Build capacity in the region in form of both equipment and personnel to enable seismology related research to be carried out
• Carry out active fault investigation, mapping and analysis for the region to build up a database for input into seismic hazard analysis update. The availability of seismic data will enable seismic hazard assessments to be carried out. The information is required by development planners, government and industry for planning purposes.

The monitoring occurs through a continued operation of seismic stations in the nine countries that comprise ESARSWG: The data are analyzed collectively within the network to produce seismological bulletins for the region and compile a regional earthquake catalogue for use in periodic regional seismic hazard analysis update.