Earthquake Damage Patterns Resolve Complex Rupture Processes

Yann Klinger (1) , Kurama Okubo (2) , Amaury Vallage (1) , Johann Champenois (3) , Arthur Delorme (1) , Esteban Rougier (4) , Zhou Lei (4) , Earl E Knight (4) , Antonio Munjiza (5) , Claudio Satriano (1) , Stéphane Baize (6) , Robert Langridge (7) , Harsha S Bhat (8)

1 IPGP (UMR_7154) - Institut de Physique du Globe de Paris
2 IPG Paris - Institut de Physique du Globe de Paris
3 Géomatique et Télédétection
4 LANL - Los Alamos National Laboratory
5 University of Split
6 IRSN - Institut de Radioprotection et de Sûreté Nucléaire
7 GNS Science
8 LGENS - Laboratoire de géologie de l'ENS

Fracture damage patterns around faults, induced by dynamic earthquake rupture, is an invaluable record to clarify the rupture process on complex fault networks. The 2016 M w 7.8 Kaikoura earthquake in New Zealand has been reported as one of the most complex earthquakes ever documented that ruptured at-least 15 faults. High-resolution optical satellite image correlation provides distinctive profiles of displacement field around the faults, and helps visualize the off-fault damage pattern. This observational approach, coupled with a first-of-its-kind numerical tool that captures rupture and activation of off-fault damage, allowed the determination of the most likely rupture scenario. This study demonstrates that complex rupture process can be explained in a rather simple way via a synergetic combination of state-of-the-art observation and first principle physics-based numerical modeling of off-fault damage. One Sentence Summary: Distinct fracture deformation patterns around faults resolves complex earthquake rupture scenario

Domaines: Géophysique [physics.geo-ph]

Yann Klinger, Kurama Okubo, Amaury Vallage, Johann Champenois, Arthur Delorme, et al.. Earthquake Damage Patterns Resolve Complex Rupture Processes. Geophysical Research Letters, 2018, 45 (19), pp.10,279-10,287. ⟨10.1029/2018GL078842⟩. ⟨hal-02324477⟩