The region of Bhutan is thought to be the only segment of the Himalayas not having experienced a major earthquake over the past half millennium. A proposed explanation for this apparent seismic gap is partial accommodation of the India‐Asia convergence further south across the Shillong Plateau, yet the seismic behavior of the Himalayan megathrust in Bhutan is unknown. Here we present historical documents from the region reporting on an earthquake in 1714 A.D. and geological evidence of surface rupture to constrain the latest large event in this area. We compute various earthquake scenarios using empirical scaling relationships relating magnitude with intensity, source location and rupture geometry. Our results constrain the 1714 A.D. earthquake to have ruptured the megathrust in Bhutan, most likely during a M7.5–8.5 event. This finding reclassifies the apparent seismic gap to a former information gap and implies that the entire Himalayan arc has a high level of earthquake potential.
Paleoseismological evidence is indispensable for the identification of large prehistoric earthquakes and the extension of the temporal coverage of historical and instrumental earthquake catalogues. In the geological record, diverse traces of past earthquakes are found. This study presents a database of potential primary and secondary evidence for seismic activity in the past 20,000 years in Switzerland. The database includes data from sedimentological, archaeological, speleological and geomorphological research. This unique dataset allows identifying periods during which the geologic record reveals enhanced occurrence of evidence that are further discussed as potentially earthquake-triggered. For the most recent 700 years, an increased occurrence of evidence features was found. This clustering is an effect of the historical earthquakes. Furthermore, periods with enhanced occurrence are identified at six phases during the past 20,000 years. Even though dating uncertainties for the geological record are large (e.g. 14 C calibration range) and an unequivocal attribution of earthquakes as trigger
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