Earthquake swarms attributed to subsurface fluid injection are usually assumed to occur on faults destabilized by increased pore-fluid pressures. However, fluid injection could also activate aseismic slip, which might outpace pore-fluid migration and transmit earthquake-triggering stress changes beyond the fluid-pressurized region. We tested this theoretical prediction against data derived from fluid-injection experiments that activated and measured slow, aseismic slip on preexisting, shallow faults. We found that the pore pressure and slip history imply a fault whose strength is the product of a slip-weakening friction coefficient and the local effective normal stress. Using a coupled shear-rupture model, we derived constraints on the hydromechanical parameters of the actively deforming fault. The inferred aseismic rupture front propagates faster and to larger distances than the diffusion of pressurized pore fluid.
[1] We model landslide initiation as slip surface growth driven by locally elevated pore pressure, with particular reference to submarine slides. Assuming an elastic medium and friction that weakens with slip, solutions exist in which the slip surface may dynamically grow, without further pore pressure increases, at a rate of the order of the sediment shear wave speed, a situation comparable to earthquake nucleation. The size of the rupture at this transition point depends weakly on the imposed pore pressure profile; however, the amount of slip at the transition depends strongly on whether the pore pressure was broadly or sharply elevated. Sharper profiles may result in pore pressures reaching the total slope-normal stress before dynamic rupture is nucleated. While we do not account for modes of failure other than pure slip on a failure surface, this may be an indication that additional modes involving liquefaction or hydraulic cracking may be factors in the initiation of shallow slope failure. We identify two length scales, one geometrical (h, depth below the free surface) and one material (', determined by the frictional weakening rate) and a transition in nucleation behavior between effectively "deep" and "shallow" limits dependent on their ratio. Whether dynamic propagation of failure is indefinite or arresting depends largely on whether the background shear stress is closer to nominal peak or residual frictional strength. This is determined in part by background pore pressures, and to consider the submarine case we simplify a common sedimentation/consolidation approach to reflect interest in near-seafloor conditions. Citation: Viesca, R. C., and J. R. Rice (2012), Nucleation of slip-weakening rupture instability in landslides by localized increase of pore pressure,
[1] We present an analysis of inelastic off-fault response in fluid-saturated material during earthquake shear rupture. The analysis is conducted for 2-D plane strain deformation using an explicit dynamic finite element formulation. Along the fault, linear slip-weakening behavior is specified, and the off-fault material is described using an elastic-plastic description of the Drucker-Prager form, which characterizes the brittle behavior of rocks under compressive stress when the primary mode of inelastic deformation is frictional sliding of fissure surfaces, microcracking and granular flow. In this part (part 1), pore pressure changes were neglected in materials bordering the fault. In part 2, we more fully address the effects of fluid saturation. During the rapid stressing by a propagating rupture, the associated undrained response of the surrounding fluid-saturated material may be either strengthened or weakened against inelastic deformation. We consider poroelastoplastic materials with and without plastic dilation. During nondilatant undrained response near a propagating rupture, large increases in pore pressure on the compressional side of the fault decrease the effective normal stress and weaken the material, and decreases in pore pressure on the extensional side strengthen the material. Positive plastic dilatancy reduces pore pressure, universally strengthening the material. Dilatantly strengthened undrained deformation has a diffusive instability on a long enough timescale when the underlying drained deformation is unstable. Neglecting this instability on the short timescale of plastic straining, we show that undrained deformation is notably more resistant to shear localization than predicted by neglect of pore pressure changes.Citation: Viesca, R. C., E. L. Templeton, and J. R. Rice (2008), Off-fault plasticity and earthquake rupture dynamics: 2. Effects of fluid saturation,
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