Interpretation of Gravity Data in the Jericho Area

A detailed gravity survey was conducted in this study. More than 100 new gravity stations, with an average spacing of about 0.5 km, were measured. Qualitative interpretation of the compiled Bouguer anomaly map in the Jericho area is presented. The most prominent feature of the Bouguer anomalies is the presence of negative values mainly trending in the NNE-SSW direction. This trend reaches a horizontal gravity gradient of up to 10 mGal/km towards east. High negative anomalies of about -30 mGal are observed to occur along the eastern side caused by thick, low-density young sediments filled in the Dead Sea rift. Wavelength filtering technique was used to analyze the gravity data in order to separate the effect of regional structures from that of local geologic features. The residual anomaly map shows positive and negative anomalies that differ in their amplitudes, sizes and trends, possibly due to lateral lithological variations in the subsurface geology within the upper most part of the crust