Category: BSSA

Kenneth W. Campbell Awarded 2025 Bruce Bolt Medal

Published on | Awards, BSSA, Member, News
Campbell has been a leader at several professional organizations, including CoreLogic Inc. and EQE International/EQECAT, focused on seismic hazard and risk analysis used in the insurance industry. His career also includes work for the U.S. Geological Survey and consulting companies specializing in developing design ground motion for worldwide critical facilities and oil platforms. He is perhaps best well-known for his impactful studies in ground motion modeling, several of which were cited by his peers in their nomination of Campbell for the Bolt Medal. These groundbreaking papers include the 1981 Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America paper “Near-Source Attenuation of Peak Horizontal Acceleration,” which introduced the concept of magnitude saturation of peak ground acceleration; and the 2003 BSSA paper “Prediction of Strong Ground Motion Using the Hybrid Empirical Method and Its Use in the Development of Ground-Motion (Attenuation) Relations in Eastern North America,” which pioneered the concept of the “hybrid-empirical method” for developing ground motion models in regions with sparse ground-motion recordings. Starting in 2003, Campbell participated in the Next Generation Attenuation (NGA) project series NGA-West, NGA-West2, NGA-East and NGA-Subduction, providing supporting studies for ground motion model development. These models have been adopted by the U.S. Geological Survey for the development of the USGS National Seismic Hazard maps, which inform seismic design codes across the country. Campbell has also worked as a consultant on high-profile infrastructure projects in the U.S. and internationally, including the seismic hazard analysis of the California High-Speed Rail project and multiple levels of the Senior Seismic Hazard Analysis Committee (SSHAC) projects for the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. He has also served as a seismic hazard expert for the International Atomic Energy Agency.

15 November 2024–The Earthquake Engineering Research Institute (EERI), the Consortium of Organizations for Strong Motion Observation Systems (COSMOS), and SSA are pleased to announce that Kenneth W. Campbell of CoreLogic Inc. (retired) is the recipient of the 2025 Bruce Bolt Medal. Campbell was recognized for his 50 years of research … Continue Reading »

Precariously Balanced Rocks in New York, Vermont Provide Limits on Earthquake Shaking

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10 September 2024–Five boulders, delivered by glacier and balancing delicately on rocky pedestals in northern New York and Vermont, can help define long-term maximum shaking intensity of earthquakes in the region. Seismologists examine the fragility of precariously balanced rocks, or PBRs, to determine the intensity of shaking would be needed … Continue Reading »

In-Building Data from Small to Moderate Earthquakes Can Help Predict Structural Response

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Grenoble City Hall building

15 August 2024–Data recorded by seismic instrumentation in buildings where ground motion is weak to moderate can help engineers better understand structural responses to earthquakes, according to a new paper published in the Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America. Philippe Guéguen and Ariana Astorga at Université Grenoble Alpes – … Continue Reading »

Earthquake Fatality Measure Offers New Way to Estimate Impact on Countries

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Ruins of Pelileo in Ambato — after the 1949 Ambato earthquake in Ecuador

15 February 2024–A new measure that compares earthquake-related fatalities to a country’s population size concludes that Ecuador, Lebanon, Haiti, Turkmenistan, Iran and Portugal have experienced the greatest impact from fatalities in the past five centuries. The new impact measure, introduced in the Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America by … Continue Reading »