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The morphology of the transition from flat to normal subduction in eastern central Mexico is explored using intraslab earthquakes recorded by temporary and permanent regional seismic arrays. Observations of a sharp transition in slab dip near the abrupt end of the Trans-Mexican Volcanic Belt (TMVB) suggest a possible slab tear located within the subducted South Cocos plate. The eastern lateral extent of a thin ultra-slow velocity layer (USL) imaged atop the Cocos slab in recent studies along the Meso America Subduction Experiment array is examined here using additional data. We find an end to this USL which is coincident with the western boundary of a zone of decreased seismicity and the end of the TMVB near the sharp transition in slab dip. Waveform modeling of the 2-D structure in this region using a finite difference algorithm provides constraints on the velocity and geometry of the slab's seismic structure and confirms the location of the USL. Analysis of intraslab seismicity patterns reveals clustering, sudden increase in depth, variable focal mechanism orientations and faulting types, and alignment of source mechanisms along the sharp transition in slab dip. The seismicity and structural evidence suggests a possible tear in the South Cocos slab. This potential tear, together with the tear along the Orozco Fracture Zone to the northwest, indicates a slab rollback mechanism in which separate slab segments move independently, allowing for mantle flow between the segments.

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[1] The fine-scale seismic structure of the central Mexico subduction zone is studied using moderate-sized (M4-6) intraslab earthquakes. Regional waveforms from the Mapping the Rivera Subduction Zone (MARS) seismic array are complicated and contain detailed information about the subduction zone structure, including evidence of lateral heterogeneity. This waveform information is used to model the structure of the subducted plates, particularly along the transition from flat to normal subduction, where recent studies have shown evidence for possible slab tearing along the eastern projection of the Orozco Fracture Zone (OFZ). The lateral extent of a thin ultra-slow velocity layer (USL) imaged atop the Cocos slab in recent studies along the Meso America Subduction Experiment array is examined here using MARS waveforms. We find an edge to this USL which is coincident with the western boundary of the projected OFZ region. Forward modeling of the 2D structure of the subducted Rivera and Cocos plates using a finite difference algorithm provides constraints on the velocity and geometry of each slab's seismic structure in this region and confirms the location of the USL edge. We propose that the Cocos slab is currently fragmenting into a North Cocos plate and a South Cocos plate along the projection of the OFZ, in agreement with observations of variable Cocos plate motion on either side of the OFZ. This tearing event may be a young analogy to the 10 Ma Rivera-Cocos plate boundary, and may be related to the slab rollback in central Mexico.

The source spectral properties of injection‐induced earthquakes give insight into their nucleation, rupture processes, and influence on ground motion. Here we apply a spectral decomposition approach to analyze P wave spectra and estimate Brune‐type stress drop for more than 2,000 ML1.5–5.2 earthquakes occurring in southern Kansas from 2014 to 2016. We find that these earthquakes are characterized by low stress drop values (median ∼0.4 MPa) compared to natural seismicity in California. We observe a significant increase in stress drop as a function of depth, but the shallow depth distribution of these events is not by itself sufficient to explain their lower stress drop. Stress drop increases with magnitude from M1.5 to M3.5, but this scaling trend may weaken above M4 and also depends on the assumed source model. Although we observe a nonstationary, sequence‐specific temporal evolution in stress drop, we find no clear systematic relation with the activity of nearby injection wells.