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Landslides are the main secondary effects of earthquakes in mountainous areas. The spatial distribution of these landslides is controlled by the local seismic ground motion and the local slope stability. While gravitational instabilities in arid and semi-arid environments are understudied, we document the landslides triggered by the Sarpol Zahab earthquake (November 12, 2017, Mw7.3, Iran/Iraq border), the largest event ever recorded in the semi-arid Zagros Mountains. An original earthquake-induced landslide inventory was derived, encompassing landslides of various sizes and velocities (from rapid disrupted rockfalls to slow-moving coherent landslides). This inventory confirms the low level of triggered landslides in semi-arid environments. It also displays clear differences in the spatial and volumetric distributions of earthquake-induced landslides, having 386 rockfalls of limited size triggered around the epicenter, and 9 giant (areas of ca. 106 m2) active and ancient deep-seated landslides coseismically accelerated at locations up to 180 km from the epicenter. This unusual distant triggering is discussed and interpreted as an interaction between the earthquake source properties and the local geological conditions, emphasizing the key role of seismic ground motion variability at short spatial scales in triggering landslides. Finally, the study documents the kinematics of slow-moving ancient landslides accelerated by earthquakes, and opens up new perspectives for studying landslide triggering over short (~ 1–10 years) and long-time (~ 1000–10,000 years) periods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Arias intensity is considered as a shaking parameter suitable for characterizing earthquake impact on ground stability. Within the framework of a study aimed at providing tools for the assessment of hazards related to earthquake-induced slope failures, Arias intensity attenuation relations were determined for the Zagros Mountains region, an active tectonic belt elongated NW–SE in the western and south-western part of Iran. The calculation of relation coefficients was based on strong-motion data of earthquakes located in the Zagros area and recorded by Iranian stations managed by the Building and Housing Research Center of Iran (BHRC). Five models of attenuation relation were considered and their coefficients were estimated through a least-square regression analysis. The relations obtained were then applied to a data sample different from that used for regression and the root mean square (RMS) of residuals was examined in order to compare effectiveness of different relations in probabilistic estimates. Furthermore a comparison made with attenuation relations obtained for Alborz and the central part of Iran showed significant differences possibly related to structural differences. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]