The M S7.1 Yushu earthquake surface rupture and large historical earthquakes on the Garzê-Yushu Fault

As revealed by field investigations, the co-seismic surface rupture zone of the 2010 M_S7.1 Yushu earthquake, Qinghai is a char-acteristic sinistral strike-slip feature consisting of three distinct sinistral primary ruptures, with an overall strike of 310°–320° and a total length of 31 km. In addition, an approximately 2-km-long en-echelon tensile fissure zone was found east of Longbao Town; if this site is taken as the north end of the rupture zone, then the rupture had a total length of ~51 km. The surface rupture zone is composed of a series of fissures arranged in an en-echelon or alternating relationship between compressive bulges and tensile fissures, with a measured maximum horizontal displacement of 1.8 m. The surface rupture zone extends along the mapped Garzê-Yushu Fault, which implicates it as the seismogenic fault for this earthquake. Historically, a few earthquakes with a magnitude of about 7 have occurred along the fault, and additionally traces of paleoearthquakes are evident that characterize the short-period recurrence interval of large earthquakes here. Similar to the seismogenic process of the 2008 Wenchuan earthquake, the Yushu earthquake is also due to the stress accumulation and release on the block boundaries resulting from the eastward expansion of Qinghai-Tibet Plateau. However, in contrast with the Wenchuan earthquake, the Yushu earthquake had a sinistral strike-slip mechanism resulting from the uneven eastward extrusion of the Baryan Har and Sichuan-Yunnan fault blocks.     

活动断层分段研究

地震发生在活动断层上,而断层活动不一定都发震,为进行地震危险性分析,确定未来可能发生地震的地段和强度。因此,把活动断层分成地震破裂段进行研究,分析断层活动在时间上、空间上的不均匀性,了解破裂段特征和分段标志,确定破坏性地震发震的构造条件是极为重要的。     

九寨沟Ms 7.0级地震的左旋走滑作用与动力机制

2017年8月8日四川九寨沟发生的Ms 7.0级地震是继2008年汶川Ms 8.0地震、2013年芦山Ms 7.0级地震后在青藏高原东缘发生的又一次强震。本文通过综合分析九寨沟Ms 7.0级地震及历史地震的震源机制解、余震和历史地震分布、区域应力场、活动断层等资料,来揭示九寨沟地震的发震构造与动力机制。初步研究结果表明:(1)此次地震的震中位于塔藏断裂、岷江断裂和虎牙断裂之间的交汇区,显示活动断裂的交汇区对此次地震的发生具有控制作用;(2)发震断裂为虎牙断裂,断裂走向为北西西向,倾向南西,倾角较陡,属于高倾角左旋走滑型地震;(3)震中位于虎牙断裂北段的北部地震空区,充填了1973年和1976年4次大于Mw6.0级地震空区;(4)此次地震位于2008年汶川Ms 8.0级地震的库仑应力增加区,应是汶川地震的应力传递和触发的结果;(5)此次地震位于巴颜喀拉块体的东北部顶角区,青藏高原东缘下地壳流向北东方向的挤出是驱动此次地震的动力机制。     

The maximum coseismic vertical surface displacement and surface deformation pattern accompanying the Ms 8.0 Wenchuan earthquake

The amount of coseismic deformation and its distribution of the Wenchuan earthquake provide important scientific bases for revealing the mechanisms of earthquake preparation and characterizing the rupture propagation of the Wenchuan earthquake. The previous studies have indicated that the earthquake ruptured the middle-to-north segment of the Longmenshan central fault and the middle segment of the Longmenshan range-front fault, which are characterized by two surface rupture zones of 240 km and 90 km in length, respectively. Based on the pre-earthquake information and photos of landforms and buildings obtained through ge-ologic and geomorphic survey of the area around Shaba Village of Beichuan County, Sichuan Province and the extensive interview with local villagers, we measured the displacements of the major terrain features and the dislocated buildings by total station instruments and differential GPS and obtained the maximum vertical displacement of 9±0.5 m and right-lateral displacement of 2±0.5 m around the Zou’s house in Shaba Village. Though the near-surface deformation exhibits a normal faulting around Shaba Village, the dynamic environment has not changed on the whole. The NW wall of the fault uplifted but without gravity gliding as normally occurring on the hanging wall of a normal fault, which proves that the 9±0.5 m displacement should be the maximum coseismic vertical displacement of the May 12, 2008 Ms 8.0 Wenchuan earthquake.     

Stress changes from the 2008 Wenchuan earthquake and increased hazard in the Sichuan basin

On 12 May 2008, the devastating magnitude 7.9 (Wenchuan) earthquake struck the eastern edge of the Tibetan plateau, collapsing buildings and killing thousands in major cities aligned along the western Sichuan basin in China. After such a large-magnitude earthquake, rearrangement of stresses in the crust commonly leads to subsequent damaging earthquakes. The mainshock of the 12 May earthquake ruptured with as much as 9 m of slip along the boundary between the Longmen Shan and Sichuan basin, and demonstrated the complex strike-slip and thrust motion that characterizes the region. The Sichuan basin and surroundings are also crossed by other active strike-slip and thrust faults. Here we present calculations of the coseismic stress changes that resulted from the 12 May event using models of those faults, and show that many indicate significant stress increases. Rapid mapping of such stress changes can help to locate fault sections with relatively higher odds of producing large aftershocks.     

Seismic hazard in the Marmara Sea region following the 17 August 1999 Izmit earthquake

On 17 August 1999, a destructive magnitude 7.4 earthquake occurred 100 km east of Istanbul, near the city of Izmit, on the North Anatolian fault. This 1,600-km-long plate boundary slips at an average rate of 2-3 cm yr(-1), and historically has been the site of many devastating earthquakes. This century alone it has ruptured over 900 km of its length. Models of earthquake-induced stress change combined with active fault maps had been used to forecast that the epicentral area of the 1999 Izmit event was indeed a likely location for the occurrence of a large earthquake. Here we show that the 1999 event itself significantly modifies the stress distribution resulting from previous fault interactions. Our new stress models take into account all events in the region with magnitudes greater than 6 having occurred since 1700 as well as secular interseismic stress change, constrained by GPS data. These models provide a consistent picture of the long term spatio-temporal behaviour of the North Anatolian fault and indicate that two events of magnitude equal to, or greater than, the Izmit earthquake are likely to occur within the next decades beneath the Marmara Sea, south of Istanbul.     

Earthquakes as beacons of stress change

Aftershocks occurring on faults in the far-field of a large earthquake rupture can generally be accounted for by changes in static stress on these faults caused by the rupture. This implies that faults interact, and that the timing of an earthquake can be affected by previous nearby ruptures. Here we explore the potential of small earthquakes to act as 'beacons' for the mechanical state of the crust. We investigate the static-stress changes resulting from the 1992 Landers earthquake in southern California which occurred in an area of high seismic activity stemming from many faults. We first gauge the response of the regional seismicity to the Landers event with a new technique, and then apply the same method to the inverse problem of determining the slip distribution on the main rupture from the seismicity. Assuming justifiable parameters, we derive credible matches to slip profiles obtained directly from the Landers mainshock. Our results provide a way to monitor mechanical conditions in the upper crust, and to investigate processes leading to fault failure.     

Analysing the 1811-1812 New Madrid earthquakes with recent instrumentally recorded aftershocks

Although dynamic stress changes associated with the passage of seismic waves are thought to trigger earthquakes at great distances, more than 60 per cent of all aftershocks appear to be triggered by static stress changes within two rupture lengths of a mainshock. The observed distribution of aftershocks may thus be used to infer details of mainshock rupture geometry. Aftershocks following large mid-continental earthquakes, where background stressing rates are low, are known to persist for centuries, and models based on rate-and-state friction laws provide theoretical support for this inference. Most past studies of the New Madrid earthquake sequence have indeed assumed ongoing microseismicity to be a continuing aftershock sequence. Here we use instrumentally recorded aftershock locations and models of elastic stress change to develop a kinematically consistent rupture scenario for three of the four largest earthquakes of the 1811-1812 New Madrid sequence. Our results suggest that these three events occurred on two contiguous faults, producing lobes of increased stress near fault intersections and end points, in areas where present-day microearthquakes have been hitherto interpreted as evidence of primary mainshock rupture. We infer that the remaining New Madrid mainshock may have occurred more than 200 km north of this region in the Wabash Valley of southern Indiana and Illinois--an area that contains abundant modern microseismicity, and where substantial liquefaction was documented by historic accounts. Our results suggest that future large mid-plate earthquake sequences may extend over a much broader region than previously suspected.     

Predecessors of the giant 1960 Chile earthquake

It is commonly thought that the longer the time since last earthquake, the larger the next earthquake's slip will be. But this logical predictor of earthquake size, unsuccessful for large earthquakes on a strike-slip fault, fails also with the giant 1960 Chile earthquake of magnitude 9.5 (ref. 3). Although the time since the preceding earthquake spanned 123 years (refs 4, 5), the estimated slip in 1960, which occurred on a fault between the Nazca and South American tectonic plates, equalled 250-350 years' worth of the plate motion. Thus the average interval between such giant earthquakes on this fault should span several centuries. Here we present evidence that such long intervals were indeed typical of the last two millennia. We use buried soils and sand layers as records of tectonic subsidence and tsunami inundation at an estuary midway along the 1960 rupture. In these records, the 1960 earthquake ended a recurrence interval that had begun almost four centuries before, with an earthquake documented by Spanish conquistadors in 1575. Two later earthquakes, in 1737 and 1837, produced little if any subsidence or tsunami at the estuary and they therefore probably left the fault partly loaded with accumulated plate motion that the 1960 earthquake then expended.     

Remote triggering of deep earthquakes in the 2002 Tonga sequences

It is well established that an earthquake in the Earth's crust can trigger subsequent earthquakes, but such triggering has not been documented for deeper earthquakes. Models for shallow fault interactions suggest that static (permanent) stress changes can trigger nearby earthquakes, within a few fault lengths from the causative earthquake, whereas dynamic (transient) stresses carried by seismic waves may trigger earthquakes both nearby and at remote distances. Here we present a detailed analysis of the 19 August 2002 Tonga deep earthquake sequences and show evidence for both static and dynamic triggering. Seven minutes after a magnitude 7.6 earthquake occurred at a depth of 598 km, a magnitude 7.7 earthquake (664 km depth) occurred 300 km away, in a previously aseismic region. We found that nearby aftershocks of the first mainshock are preferentially located in regions where static stresses are predicted to have been enhanced by the mainshock. But the second mainshock and other triggered events are located at larger distances where static stress increases should be negligible, thus suggesting dynamic triggering. The origin times of the triggered events do not correspond to arrival times of the main seismic waves from the mainshocks and the dynamically triggered earthquakes frequently occur in aseismic regions below or adjacent to the seismic zone. We propose that these events are triggered by transient effects in regions near criticality, but where earthquakes have difficulty nucleating without external influences.     

Plateau 'pop-up' in the great 1897 Assam earthquake

The great Assam earthquake of 12 June 1897 reduced to rubble all masonry buildings within a region of northeastern India roughly the size of England, and was felt over an area exceeding that of the great 1755 Lisbon earthquake. Hitherto it was believed that rupture occurred on a north-dipping Himalayan thrust fault propagating south of Bhutan. But here we show that the northern edge of the Shillong plateau rose violently by at least 11 m during the Assam earthquake, and that this was due to the rupture of a buried reverse fault approximately 110 km in length and dipping steeply away from the Himalaya. The stress drop implied by the rupture geometry and the prodigious fault slip of 18 +/- 7 m explains epicentral accelerations observed to exceed 1g vertically and surface velocities exceeding 3 m s-1 (ref. 1). This quantitative observation of active deformation of a 'pop-up' structure confirms that faults bounding such structures can penetrate the whole crust. Plateau uplift in the past 2-5 million years has caused the Indian plate to contract locally by 4 +/- 2 mm yr-1, reducing seismic risk in Bhutan but increasing the risk in northern Bangladesh.     

Fracture surface energy of the Punchbowl fault, San Andreas system

Fracture energy is a form of latent heat required to create an earthquake rupture surface and is related to parameters governing rupture propagation and processes of slip weakening. Fracture energy has been estimated from seismological and experimental rock deformation data, yet its magnitude, mechanisms of rupture surface formation and processes leading to slip weakening are not well defined. Here we quantify structural observations of the Punchbowl fault, a large-displacement exhumed fault in the San Andreas fault system, and show that the energy required to create the fracture surface area in the fault is about 300 times greater than seismological estimates would predict for a single large earthquake. If fracture energy is attributed entirely to the production of fracture surfaces, then all of the fracture surface area in the Punchbowl fault could have been produced by earthquake displacements totalling <1 km. But this would only account for a small fraction of the total energy budget, and therefore additional processes probably contributed to slip weakening during earthquake rupture.     

The deterministic nature of earthquake rupture

Understanding the earthquake rupture process is central to our understanding of fault systems and earthquake hazards. Multiple hypotheses concerning the nature of fault rupture have been proposed but no unifying theory has emerged. The conceptual hypothesis most commonly cited is the cascade model for fault rupture. In the cascade model, slip initiates on a small fault patch and continues to rupture further across a fault plane as long as the conditions are favourable. Two fundamental implications of this domino-like theory are that small earthquakes begin in the same manner as large earthquakes and that the rupture process is not deterministic--that is, the size of the earthquake cannot be determined until the cessation of rupture. Here we show that the frequency content of radiated seismic energy within the first few seconds of rupture scales with the final magnitude of the event. We infer that the magnitude of an earthquake can therefore be estimated before the rupture is complete. This finding implies that the rupture process is to some degree deterministic and has implications for the physics of the rupture process.     

Three-dimensional deformation caused by the Bam, Iran, earthquake and the origin of shallow slip deficit

Our understanding of the earthquake process requires detailed insights into how the tectonic stresses are accumulated and released on seismogenic faults. We derive the full vector displacement field due to the Bam, Iran, earthquake of moment magnitude 6.5 using radar data from the Envisat satellite of the European Space Agency. Analysis of surface deformation indicates that most of the seismic moment release along the 20-km-long strike-slip rupture occurred at a shallow depth of 4-5 km, yet the rupture did not break the surface. The Bam event may therefore represent an end-member case of the 'shallow slip deficit' model, which postulates that coseismic slip in the uppermost crust is systematically less than that at seismogenic depths (4-10 km). The InSAR-derived surface displacement data from the Bam and other large shallow earthquakes suggest that the uppermost section of the seismogenic crust around young and developing faults may undergo a distributed failure in the interseismic period, thereby accumulating little elastic strain.     

利用相对反投影方法对2010年Mw 8.8级智利地震破裂过程成像

基于美国流动台网的三分量远震P波资料,利用相对反投影方法,对2010年2月27日Mw 8.8智利地震的破裂过程成像。根据美国地质调查局(USGS)给出的震源参数及源区地质资料,设定一个小倾角断层面。将远震P波反投影至该断层面上,获取震源破裂过程。结果表明,智利地震破裂由3个子事件组成,破裂长度至少为513 km,宽度至少为100 km。破裂从震中开始向北方和南方两个方向双侧扩展,但北侧的破裂明显强于南侧。北侧的破裂长度约为340 km,破裂持续时间约125 s,破裂速度约为2.87 km/s;而南侧破裂长度约为173 km,破裂持续时间约99 s,破裂速度约为1.84 km/s。另外,北侧两个子事件的能量释放高峰分别出现在破裂开始之后16 s和79 s,与初始破裂点的距离分别为75 km和230 km。南侧子事件的能量释放高峰出现时刻为80 s,与初始破裂点的距离为145 km。智利地震在破裂过程中可能受到了破裂区域的障碍体影响。     

Tracking the rupture of the Mw = 9.3 Sumatra earthquake over 1,150 km at teleseismic distance

On 26 December 2004, a moment magnitude Mw = 9.3 earthquake occurred along Northern Sumatra, the Nicobar and Andaman islands, resulting in a devastating tsunami in the Indian Ocean region. The rapid and accurate estimation of the rupture length and direction of such tsunami-generating earthquakes is crucial for constraining both tsunami wave-height models as well as the seismic moment of the events. Compressional seismic waves generated at the hypocentre of the Sumatra earthquake arrived after about 12 min at the broadband seismic stations of the German Regional Seismic Network (GRSN), located approximately 9,000 km from the event. Here we present a modification of a standard array-seismological approach and show that it is possible to track the propagating rupture front of the Sumatra earthquake over a total rupture length of 1,150 km. We estimate the average rupture speed to be 2.3-2.7 km s(-1) and the total duration of rupture to be at least 430 s, and probably between 480 and 500 s.     

Triggering of earthquake aftershocks by dynamic stresses

It is thought that small 'static' stress changes due to permanent fault displacement can alter the likelihood of, or trigger, earthquakes on nearby faults. Many studies of triggering in the near-field, particularly of aftershocks, rely on these static changes as the triggering agent and consider them only in terms of equivalent changes in the applied load on the fault. Here we report a comparison of the aftershock pattern of the moment magnitude Mw = 7.3 Landers earthquake, not only with static stress changes but also with transient, oscillatory stress changes transmitted as seismic waves (that is, 'dynamic' stresses). Dynamic stresses do not permanently change the applied load and thus can trigger earthquakes only by altering the mechanical state or properties of the fault zone. These dynamically weakened faults may fail after the seismic waves have passed by, and might even cause earthquakes that would not otherwise have occurred. We find similar asymmetries in the aftershock and dynamic stress patterns, the latter being due to rupture propagation, whereas the static stress changes lack this asymmetry. Previous studies have shown that dynamic stresses can promote failure at remote distances, but here we show that they can also do so nearby.     

Extent, duration and speed of the 2004 Sumatra-Andaman earthquake imaged by the Hi-Net array

The disastrous Sumatra-Andaman earthquake of 26 December 2004 was one of the largest ever recorded. The damage potential of such earthquakes depends on the extent and magnitude of fault slip. The first reliable moment magnitude estimate of 9.0 was obtained several hours after the Sumatra-Andaman earthquake, but more recent, longer-period, normal-mode analyses have indicated that it had a moment magnitude of 9.3, about 2.5 times larger. Here we introduce a method for directly imaging earthquake rupture that uses the first-arriving compressional wave and is potentially able to produce detailed images within 30 min of rupture initiation. We used the Hi-Net seismic array in Japan as an antenna to map the progression of slip by monitoring the direction of high-frequency radiation. We find that the rupture spread over the entire 1,300-km-long aftershock zone by propagating northward at roughly 2.8 km s(-1) for approximately 8 minutes. Comparisons with the aftershock areas of other great earthquakes indicate that the Sumatra-Andaman earthquake did indeed have a moment magnitude of approximately 9.3. Its rupture, in both duration and extent, is the longest ever recorded.     

Damage to the shallow Landers fault from the nearby Hector Mine earthquake

Crustal faults have long been identified as sites where localized sliding motion occurs during earthquakes, which allows for the relative motion between adjacent crustal blocks. Although there is a growing awareness that we must understand the evolution of fault systems on many timescales to relate present-day crustal stresses and fault motions to geological structures formed in the past, fault-zone damage and healing have been documented quantitatively in only a few cases. We have been monitoring the healing of damage on the shallow Johnson Valley fault after its rupture in the 1992 magnitude-7.3 Landers earthquake, and here we report that this healing was interrupted in 1999 by the magnitude-7.1 Hector Mine earthquake rupture, which occurred 20-30 km away. The Hector Mine earthquake both strongly shook and permanently strained the Johnson Valley fault, adding damage discernible as a temporary reversal of the healing process. The fault has since resumed the trend of strength recovery that it showed after the Landers earthquake. These observations lead us to speculate that fault damage caused by strong seismic waves may help to explain earthquake clustering and seismicity triggering by shaking, and may be involved in friction reduction during faulting.     

小江断裂带及其周边地区构造应力场特征

 应用Snoke方法计算了2000—2009年发生在小江断裂带及其周边地区的55个中小地震震源机制解.根据震源机制解分析,该区震源错动类型主要为走滑型,其次是逆断型,与小江断裂左旋走滑运动相符.整个区域主要受到近水平的北北西—南南东向挤压,自北向南主压应力轴方位从南东转为南南东,与川滇菱形块体沿南东—南南东向的走滑和旋转运动相一致.另外,构造应力方向在0~20 km内有从北西西转为北北西的趋势,考虑力轴仰角无明显变化,认为构造应力在此深度内是相对连续的.