Preprints
Search for earthquake (647 results)
P- and S-Wave Travel-Time Characteristics and Station-Dependent Residuals from Local Earthquakes in Ghana
Published: 2026-10-09
Subjects: Physical Sciences and Mathematics
Understanding P- and S-wave travel-time behaviour is important for characterizing seismic-wave propagation and identifying station-dependent variability within regional seismic networks. This study investigates P- and S-wave travel-time characteristics and station-dependent residuals using local earthquakes recorded by the Ghana Digital Seismic Network (GHDSN). The analysis reexamines the [...]
The critical role of stored energy in metamorphism
Published: 2026-10-09
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Geology, Physical Sciences and Mathematics
The mechanical behaviour of the Earth is widely assumed to change with increasing timescale as rocks progressively relax imposed stresses [1]. On short timescales, elasticity dominates and its release drives earthquakes [2]; at intermediate timescales, viscoelastic relaxation facilitates processes such as glacial rebound [3]; whereas over geological timescales viscous deformation dominates, [...]
Understanding Earthquake Physics with On-Fault Observatories
Published: 2026-10-02
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Geology, Geophysics and Seismology, Physical Sciences and Mathematics
Earthquakes often strike without warning. Current fault monitoring infrastructure is not sensitive enough to detect signals such as accelerating fault creep or dilation, which laboratory experiments and numerical models predict may precede large earthquakes. Here we argue that a paradigm shift is needed and technically achievable: from inferring faulting processes from a distance with surface [...]
Earthquake damage mapping from Sentinel-1 modeling against coherence damage proxy
Published: 2026-09-30
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Geophysics and Seismology, Physical Sciences and Mathematics
This paper tests whether a supervised model that uses the same Sentinel-1 signal as the coherence damage proxy can rank earthquake damage better than the proxy itself. Damage grades from Copernicus EMS for four earthquakes are joined to 783 635 OpenStreet- Map footprints over 28 assessed areas, and the coherence drop is aggregated to buildings, morphological blocks and cells of 50 m to 400 m. A [...]
The June 2026 Socorro swarm: A reactivation of rift-parallel normal faults above the Socorro Magma Body
Published: 2026-09-28
Subjects: Geophysics and Seismology
In June 2026 an earthquake swarm of maximum local magnitude (ML) 3.9, comprising 425 matched-filter detections, occurred in the central Rio Grande rift about 45 km north of Socorro, New Mexico, above the northern margin of the Socorro Magma Body (SMB). This setting makes a magmatic or fluid origin the natural hypothesis. We test this hypothesis against the source physics, comparing the swarm with [...]
Rapid Source Constraints and Nodal-Plane-Robust Static Stress Transfer of the 24 September 2026 Mw 5.3–5.4 Şanlıurfa Earthquake, Southeastern Türkiye
Published: 2026-09-24
Subjects: Civil and Environmental Engineering, Earth Sciences, Environmental Sciences, Other Physical Sciences and Mathematics, Physics, Risk Analysis
On 24 September 2026, a moderate earthquake occurred in southeastern Türkiye near the Hilvan–Karaköprü sector of Şanlıurfa Province. The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) reported M 5.3 at 37.4736°N, 38.8612°E and 10 km depth, whereas the Disaster and Emergency Management Authority of Türkiye (AFAD) issued a rapid Mw 5.4 solution at a shallower and approximately 5.9 km displaced hypocenter. We [...]
Compound Supershear Rupture During the 2026 Venezuela Earthquake Doublet
Published: 2026-09-18
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Geophysics and Seismology, Physical Sciences and Mathematics
The 24 June 2026 Venezuela earthquake doublet occurred along a complex transform-fault system. Teleseismic P waves encompassing both cataloged events were analyzed using potency density tensor inversion with seven structure models. All models indicate predominantly eastward rupture over approximately 220 km, including several stages of supershear propagation. Three apparent rupture stalls [...]
Biomarkers Thermal Maturity Parameters in Bitumen as a Proxy for Seismic vs. Aseismic Mirror-like Fault Surfaces
Published: 2026-09-18
Subjects: Geology
Mirror-like Surfaces (MSs) are ultra-polished fault surfaces that experimental studies have shown can form during seismic and aseismic deformation (slip rates ≈1 m/s vs. <0.0001 m/s). To determine which MSs form during seismic (rapid temperature increase) or aseismic (negligible temperature increase) slip along the fault, we measured sterane and hopane thermal maturity parameters in bituminous [...]
Seasonal variation of earthquake source characteristics of the long-duration Palghar swarm, western India
Published: 2026-09-18
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Geophysics and Seismology, Tectonics and Structure
A swarm sequence initiated in November 2018 in the Palghar region near the western coast of India, and continued with high intensity for two years. About 8300 earthquakes were found with horizontal and depth uncertainties of ≤ 1.5 km after relocation. The earthquakes were distributed along two narrow N-S oriented clusters, separated by ~5 km. We performed time-domain regional waveform full moment [...]
Undrained fault-zone poroelastic feedback enables the 2011 Prague earthquake cascade
Published: 2026-09-17
Subjects: Geophysics and Seismology
Subsurface fluid injection supports wastewater disposal, geothermal energy, and geological storage but can trigger damaging earthquakes. Predicting whether an injection-triggered rupture stops or spreads across multiple faults remains challenging. In the 2011 Prague, Oklahoma, sequence, the mechanism enabling rupture transfer to the fault hosting the third large earthquake has remained [...]
Fabric memory during repeated reversal shear in clay-rich materials: An experimental study using SEM, SP-µCT, and AMS
Published: 2026-09-09
Subjects: Tectonics and Structure
Fine-grained shear zones occur in both tectonic faults and gravitational landslides, making their origin difficult to determine from individual microstructural features alone. A potentially useful distinction is provided by deformation history: tectonic faults commonly experience repeated earthquake cycles in which the sense and magnitude of deformation may change, whereas landslide slip zones [...]
Can human seismologists verify machine-learning detected earthquakes?
Published: 2026-09-08
Subjects: Geophysics and Seismology
Routine seismic network catalogues are reviewed event by event by analysts, whereas machine-learning catalogues, which contain five to fifty times more events, leave most of their detections unexamined. Whether those detections are earthquakes can nevertheless be measured, because each one can be checked blind against its own waveforms. Human seismologists returned 4,800 blind verdicts on 1,200 [...]
Deglacial Mass-Movement Floods as a Potential Source of Catastrophic Flood Traditions: A Testable Geomythological Hypothesis
Published: 2026-09-05
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Geology, Geomorphology, Glaciology, Hydrology
Catastrophic flood traditions occur in many geographically separated cultures, but their possible geological substrates need not be uniform. Existing explanations include river floods, earthquake and volcanic tsunamis, glacial-lake outburst floods, postglacial sea-level rise, and cultural transmission. This paper proposes a complementary, explicitly testable hypothesis: during the terminal [...]
Asthenosphere rheology and the continental-scale interseismic deformation driven by repeated megathrust earthquakes: Insights from the South American plate
Published: 2026-09-04
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Geophysics and Seismology
This study presents a framework for quantifying large-scale interseismic deformation of a tectonic plate overlying a viscoelastic asthenosphere. We explain and compare four common methods for modelling upper-plate surface deformation induced by time-dependent slip on the subduction interface. One method is a widely used, purely elastic model. The other three are viscoelastic models, in which slip [...]
Typhoons reseal mountain groundwater systems after earthquake damage
Published: 2026-09-04
Subjects: Physical Sciences and Mathematics
Bedrock groundwater supplies drinking water to half the global population, and earthquakes can disrupt this resource for years by changing subsurface permeability. Previous studies proposed several mechanisms to explain coseismic permeability changes but lacked an observational tool to distinguish them; moreover, all assumed an immediate onset. Here, we analyse groundwater and seismic data from [...]