Illustrating 100 Years of Taiwan Seismicity

The instrumental observation of earthquakes in Taiwan has been initi ated since 1898. Up to 1997, about 170,000 earthquakes have been accumu lated in the earthquake catalog. It is interesting to review this 100 year seismicity at the end of this century. In this paper, we illustrate the distri butions of these earthquakes using different plotting techniques, under dif ferent categories to exhibit the nature of their occurrences. Some interest ing earthquake distribution patterns are discovered, which may not be no ticed before. It is no doubt that Taiwan earthquakes are stimulated by tec tonic movement around the island. By ultilizing earthquake distribution figures, we attempt to relate the seismicity to the tectonics. Four seismic systems which may be drived from different tectonic interactions are taken to describe their particular seismicity patterns. Many interesting features of the tectonic movement can be explained by a careful examination of the seismicity distributions. Besides, we also hope that these well documented earthquake figures will be useful for other purposes or simply for general science education.