Co-seismic fault geometry and slip distribution of the 26 December 2004, giant Sumatra–Andaman earthquake constrained by GPS, coral reef, and remote sensing data

• Published in: Earthquake science Vol. 28; no. 3; pp. 187 - 195
• Main Authors: Wan, Yongge, Shen, Zheng-kang, Wang, Min, Zeng, Yuehua, Huang, Jichao, Li, Xiang, Cui, Huawei, Gao, Xiwei
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Beijing Seismological Society of China 01.06.2015; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Angles (geometry); Dipping; Displacement; Earth and Environmental Science; Earth Sciences; Earthquakes; Fault lines; Geodetics; Geological faults; Geophysics/Geodesy; GPS; Remote sensing; Research Paper; Seismology; Slip; Strikes; 几何形状; 地震断层; 巨人; 滑动; 珊瑚礁; 苏门答腊; 遥感数据; Geodetic data; Sumatra–Andaman earthquake; Fault geometry; Co-seismic slip distribution
• ISSN: 1674-4519; 1867-8777
• DOI: 10.1007/s11589-015-0119-y

We analyze co-seismic displacement field of the 26 December 2004, giant Sumatra–Andaman earthquake derived from Global Position System observations,geological vertical measurement of coral head, and pivot line observed through remote sensing. Using the co-seismic displacement field and AK135 spherical layered Earth model, we invert co-seismic slip distribution along the seismic fault. We also search the best fault geometry model to fit the observed data. Assuming that the dip angle linearly increases in downward direction, the postfit residual variation of the inversed geometry model with dip angles linearly changing along fault strike are plotted. The geometry model with local minimum misfits is the one with dip angle linearly increasing along strike from 4.3oin top southernmost patch to 4.5oin top northernmost path and dip angle linearly increased. By using the fault shape and geodetic co-seismic data, we estimate the slip distribution on the curved fault. Our result shows that the earthquake ruptured ＊200-km width down to a depth of about 60 km.0.5–12.5 m of thrust slip is resolved with the largest slip centered around the central section of the rupture zone78N–108N in latitude. The estimated seismic moment is8.2 9 1022 N m, which is larger than estimation from the centroid moment magnitude（4.0 9 1022 N m）, and smaller than estimation from normal-mode oscillation data modeling（1.0 9 1023 N m）.