On the nature of intraplate earthquakes

Continental intraplate regions are characterized by uniform stresses over thousands of kilometers. Local stresses, with wavelengths of tens to hundreds of kilometers can accumulate at inhomogeneities lying within these regional fields. A variety of geological structures, herein called local stress concentrators (LSCs), act as elastic inhomogeneities. The temporal buildup of stress depends on the particular structure and its geometrical relationship with the regional stress field. The interaction of the local and the regional stress fields can result in the rotation of the latter over wavelengths of tens to hundreds of kilometers. This rotation can be detected by direct measurement or from seismicity data. Intraplate earthquakes (IPEs) result when the local stresses become comparable with their regional counterparts, i.e., hundreds of megapascals. Globally, most of the seismic energy release associated with IPEs occurs within old rifts which contain LSCs most favorable for stress buildup by stress inversion. Of the various LSCs, stepover en echelon faults are associated the largest IPEs. In low tectonic strain rate regions, IPEs are associated with larger stress drops. With the availability of a variety of LSCs, there is generally an absence of repeat earthquakes. Instead, successive earthquakes occur on different structures, leading to the observation of “roaming” earthquakes. These observations suggest a need for a reevaluation of seismic hazard estimation techniques. This study addresses some of these facets of the nature of IPEs with global examples, including a unique, detailed seismicity and geodetic data set collected in a dozen years following the 2001 M 7.7 Bhuj earthquake in western India.