Abstract. The 24 January 2020 Mw 6.77 Elazığ-Sivrice earthquake (Turkey), responsible for 42 casualties and ~ 1600 injured people, is the largest earthquake affecting the East Anatolian Fault (EAF) since 1971. The earthquake partially ruptured a seismic gap. The mainshock was preceded by two foreshocks with Mw ≥ 4.9 and small seismicity clusters occurring in the previous months close to the nucleation point of the main rupture. The significant aftershock sequence comprises twelve earthquakes with Mw ≥ 4.5 within 60 days. We jointly model quasi co-seismic static surface displacements from Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (InSAR) and high-frequency co-seismic data from seismological networks at local, regional and teleseismic distances to retrieve source parameters of the mainshock. We reconstruct the rupture process using a Bayesian bootstrap based probabilistic joint inversion scheme to obtain source parameters and their uncertainties. Full moment tensor for 18 fore-/after-shocks with Mw ≥ 4.3 are obtained based on the modeling of regional broadband data. The posterior mean model for the 2020 Elazığ-Sivrice mainshock shows that the earthquake, with a magnitude Mw 6.77, ruptured at shallow depth (5 ± 2 km) with a left-lateral strike-slip focal mechanism, with a dip angle of 74° ± 2° and a causative fault plane strike of 242° ± 1°, which is compatible with the orientation of the EAF at the centroid location. The rupture nucleated in the vicinity of small foreshock clusters and slowly propagated towards WSW, with a rupture velocity of ~ 2100 ± 130 m s−1 and ~ 27 s rupture duration. The main rupture area, with a length of ~ 26 ± 5 km, only covered 70 % of the former seismic gap, leaving a smaller, unbroken segment of ~ 30 km length to the SE with positive stress change. The subsequent aftershock sequence extended over a broader region of ~ 70 km in length, spreading to both sides of the mainshock rupture patch into the regions experiencing a stress increase according to our Coulomb stress modeling. Our results support the hypothesis of a shallow locking depth of the Anatolian micro-plate, which has a possible implication to the seismic bursts along the EAF and alternating seismic activity on the North Anatolian and the East Anatolian faults.
We investigate the origin of a long‐lived earthquake cluster in the Fars arc of the Zagros Simply Folded Belt that is colocated with the major Shanul natural gas field. The cluster emerged in January 2019 and initially comprised small events of Mn ∼ 3–4. It culminated on 9 June 2020 with a pair of Mw 5.4 and 5.7 earthquakes, which was followed by >100 aftershocks. We assess the spatiotemporal evolution of the earthquake sequence using multiple event hypocenter relocations, waveform inversions, and Sentinel‐1 Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (InSAR) measurements and models. We find that the early part of the sequence is spatially distinct from the 9 June 2020 earthquakes and their aftershocks. Moment tensors, centroid depths, and source parameter uncertainties of 15 of the largest (Mn ≥ 4.0) events show that the sequence is dominated by reverse faulting at shallow depths (mostly ≤4 km) within the sedimentary cover. InSAR modeling shows that the Mw 5.7 mainshock occurred at depths of 2–8 km with a rupture length and maximum slip of ∼20 km and ∼0.5 m, respectively. Our results suggest that the 2019–2020 Khalili earthquake sequence was likely influenced by operation of the Shanul field, though elevated natural seismicity in the Zagros makes the association difficult to prove. Understanding how to distinguish man‐made from natural seismicity is helpful for hazard and risk assessment, notably in the Zagros, which is both seismically active and rich in oil and gas reserves.
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