ESTABLISHMENT OF A CONTINUOUS GPS NETWORK ACROSS THE KEPHALONIA FAULTZONE, IONIAN-ISLANDS, GREECE

We report on the establishment of a continuous GPS network across the Kephalonia Fault Zone (KFZ), central Ionian islands, Greece. The KFZ i s an important segment of the boundary zone between the rapidly moving Aegean microplate and the Apulian platform, Italy. Repeated GPS measu rements carried out between the northern Ionian islands and the island of Crete have shown rates of crustal motion of the Aegean reaching 35 mm/a, oriented SW relative to southern Italy. The KFZ coincides with a maximum shear strain rate (180 nano-strain/a) and a very high level of seismicity. In order to monitor the ongoing deformation across the KFZ and correlate the strain accumulation with earthquakes, a continuo us GPS network has been installed, operating at a sampling rate of 5 s . This paper describes the instrumental set-up, the data-logging strat egy and first preliminary results. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.