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Application of Scripting Cartographic Methods to Geophysical Mapping and Seismicity in Rwenzori Mountains and Albertine Graben, Uganda Polina Lemenkova

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Application of Scripting Cartographic Methods to Geophysical Mapping and Seismicity in Rwenzori Mountains and Albertine Graben, Uganda Polina Lemenkova Application of scripting cartographic methods to geophysical mapping and seismicity in Rwenzori mountains and Albertine Graben, Uganda Polina Lemenkova To cite this version: Polina Lemenkova. Application of scripting cartographic methods to geophysical mapping and seis- micity in Rwenzori mountains and Albertine Graben, Uganda. Makerere University Journal of Agri- cultural and Environmental Sciences, 2021, 10 (1), pp.1-21. 10.5281/zenodo.5082861. hal-03282142 HAL Id: hal-03282142 https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-03282142 Submitted on 8 Jul 2021 HAL is a multi-disciplinary open access L’archive ouverte pluridisciplinaire HAL, est archive for the deposit and dissemination of sci- destinée au dépôt et à la diffusion de documents entific research documents, whether they are pub- scientifiques de niveau recherche, publiés ou non, lished or not. The documents may come from émanant des établissements d’enseignement et de teaching and research institutions in France or recherche français ou étrangers, des laboratoires abroad, or from public or private research centers. publics ou privés. Distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution| 4.0 International License Lemenkova, P. Makerere University Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences Vol. 10 (1). pp. 1 - 21, 2021 Printed in Uganda. All rights reserved © Makerere University 2021 ISSN 1563-3721 Application of scripting cartographic methods to geophysical mapping and seismicity in Rwenzori mountains and Albertine Graben, Uganda Lemenkova, P.1 1Schmidt Institute of Physics of the Earth, Russian Academy of Sciences, Department of Natural Disasters, Anthropogenic Hazards and Seismicity of the Earth, Laboratory of Regional Geophysics and Natural Disasters, (Nr. 303), Bolshaya Gruzinskaya St, 10, Bld. 1, Moscow, 123995, Russian Federation Corresponding author: [email protected] Abstract Uganda is traversed by the East African Rift System (EARS), which controls its topography and induces high seismicity in the southwestern and western parts of the country, around the Rwenzori Mountains and Albertine Graben. This paper explores the complexity of the geophysical, topographic and geomorphological settings of Uganda for linking the distribution and magnitude of earthquakes to the controlling factors: geomorphology, topography and geophysics. The methodological workflow for an automated plotting of the topographic, geophysical and seismic data includes the following important codes: ‘gmt grdimage ug_relief.nc -Cgeo.cpt -R29/35/-1.5/4.3 -JM6.5i - I+a15+ne0.75 -t50 -Xc -P -K > $ps’ for topographic visualisation, ‘gmt psxy -R -J quakes_UG.ngdc -Wfaint -i4,3,6,6s0.1 -h3 -Scc -Csteps.cpt -O -K >> $ps’ for mapping earthquakes, ‘gmt img2grd grav_27.1.img -R29/35.5/-1.5/4.3 -Ggrav_UG.grd -T1 -I1 -E -S0.1 -V’ for mapping gravity. The steps of the scripting workflow using ‘raster’ and ‘tmap’ libraries of R and a variety of GMT modules includes the following most important codes: ‘alt = getData(“alt”, country = “Uganda”, path = tempdir()); slope = terrain(alt, opt = “slope”); aspect = terrain(alt, opt = “aspect”); hill = hillShade(slope, aspect, angle = 40, direction = 270)’. The study uses high-resolution spatial datasets GEBCO, EGM-2008, IRIS, gravity grids and SRTM DEM aimed to undertake thematic mapping of Uganda. Nine new maps have been generated using shell scripts of GMT and R for environmental monitoring. Depth of the earthquakes ranges from 4 to 40 Km with frequency of seismic events near Rwenzori Mountains and Albertine Graben for destructive earthquake is less than about five decades. Earthquake magnitudes varied from 3.7 Richter Magnitude Scale (Lake Edward region) to 6.2 Richter local magnitude 1 Makerere University Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences scale (ML) (Lake Albert region). Lake Kivu region has earthquakes with magnitudes between 3.8-5.3. The region of Lake Albert had the highest magnitudes and frequency of seismic events, compared to Lakes Kivu and Edward. Earthquakes around the Lake Albert reached the highest magnitude at 6.2 ML. Earthquakes around Lake Victoria reach the maximal level of earthquake magnitude at 5.0 Ml, near Lake George - 5.3 ML. Earthquakes were mostly recorded in the Albertine Graben of EARS in the Albert, Edward and George lakes and occasionally in Lake Victoria. Key words: Albertine Graben, cartography, GMT, Rwenzori Mountains Introduction One of the most fundamental problems to environmental research is the study of the geomorphology sculpturing of relief of the Earth’s surface, where major geological processes take place. In this context, the Great Rift Valley of East Africa Rift System (EARS) presents a unique combination of graben basins forming a complex Afro- Arabian rift system. Uganda, located in the eastern part of the EARS (Fig. 1), is notable for the diverse geomorphology, consisting of volcanic hills, mountains, dense hydrologic network of lakes and river basins. The Albertine Graben is a geologically important region of Uganda and one of the most petroliferous rifts in Africa. With an average of 900 meters a.s.l., the country is framed by the mountain ranges both in its eastern and western borders: the Ruwenzori mountain with the highest mountain peak (Alexandra, 5,094 m) and an extinct shield volcano Mt. Elgon (4,321 m) in the east. Being located in the tectonically active region of the Western Branch of EARS, the western part of Uganda is seismically active, which is caused by rupture of geological faults of EARS. Geographic consequences of earthquakes includes a variety of negative events: extensive movements of landmasses which can be displaced or disrupted, triggered landslides, reactivated volcanism, intensified debris flows and rockfalls in mountainous areas (Lemenkova, 2020d). Earthquakes significantly affect, not only the structure and relief of the surrounding landscapes, but also cause serious problems in social life through the damage to property and/or losses of human life. In this regards, the cartographic methods of map visualisation have a key role to play in the issues of geomorphological mapping, because it enables one to effectively assess the topographic variability of the country. However, despite the actuality and challenge of GIS approaches, no research has been done on the application of scripting cartographic methods to geophysical mapping of Uganda; neither has there been much use of programming languages for this purpose. The existing literature presents maps of Uganda with the application of traditional GIS-based applications for 2 Lemenkova, P. Digital elevation data: GEBCO/SRTM, 15 arc sec (ca. 450 m) resolution grid Figure 1. Topographic map of Uganda. Mapping: GMT. visualisation (Aanyu and Koehn, 2011; Herbert et al., 2014; Call et al., 2017; Guma et al., 2019; Byakagaba et al., 2019). At the same time, scripting cartography enables rapid and accurate mapping using machine learning approach generating computer-based graphics. Machine learning technologies are bringing new opportunities and challenges to cartography, especially to geoinformation processing (Lemenkova, 2020a). Some regions of Uganda cannot be directly accessed for in-situ observations and field mapping, e.g. deeply dissected mountainous ridges, regions with hidden relief exposure or deep weathering, and areas with dense vegetation coverage (Bahiru and Woldai, 2016). This signifies the relevance of the computer-based applications, 3 Makerere University Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences such as scripting techniques, in geophysical mapping of Uganda, and the importance of high-resolution open data as raster grids for geophysical data processing. Therefore, the objective of this paper was to (i) investigate the tectonic factors associated with seismicity in the western region of Uganda located within the EARS; (ii) evaluate the interaction effects of geomorphological setting and geophysical anomaly fields on topographic patterns of the country; and (iii) determine the cartographic feasibility of scripting mapping and applied programming methods for geological-geographical mapping of Uganda. Regional setting Uganda is situated within the western branch of the EARS (Fig. 1), which is one of the greatest and most prominent tectonic features of Africa, and a classic example of a continental rift which has attracted attention of the world’s reputable geologists (Déprez et al., 2013; Rooney, 2020; Ebinger, 2021). The formation of the EARS has been caused by continental extension, fracturing and thinning of the Earth’s lithosphere (Chorowicz, 2005). The EARS extends in Africa from the depression of Triple Junction in the Afar Triangle of Ethiopia in the north, then continues in eastern Africa and terminates in Mozambique. The Western branch of the EARS continues as the Albertine Graben, which reflects the complex geodynamic evolution in the Western branch of the East African Rift System (Schneider et al., 2016). Lake Albert Rift experienced geologic evolution from large basin to narrow rift (Simon et al., 2017). The Western Branch of the EARS continues from Lake Albert in the north towards Lake Malawi (Nyasa) in the south. This region experienced a sequence of earthquakes within the Western Rift of the EARS, as a result of active deformation in an early- stage rift (Schaff et al., 2019). The active tectonic movements are reflected in asymmetric geomorphology of the EARS, which differs in Western and Eastern Branch (Calais et al., 2006). Regional elevations of the western branch of the EARS are less
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