Faults - offsets of geological structure

1. Movement of faults
Slow slip - produces no ground shaking
Sudden rupture - due to earthquake, most famous is the San Andreas fault Shallow focus earthquakes - much shorter
and shows much less offset.
Fault rupture - majority of earthquakes does not reach the surface
Geological mappings and geophysical work - show that faults seen at the
surface sometimes extend to depths of tens of kilometers in the Earth’s crust
2. Inactive faults
Most plotted on geological maps are now inactive faults
New discovery is also discovered from fresh ground breakage during an earthquake
Delineated by a line of cracks
Active faults
Primary interest in seismology and earthquake engineering
Rock displacement - expected to occur
Exists in a well-defined plate-edge region of the earth
Sudden fault displacement
Fault displacement
almost entirely horizontal – San Francisco earthquake along the San Andreas fault
Fault ruptures cause brittle fractures of the Earth’s crust and dissipate up to 10% of the total plate‐tectonic energy in the
form of seismic waves. Earthquake shaking is generated by two types of elastic seismic waves: body and surface waves. 
Primary or P wave – the faster body wave. Its motion is the same as that of a sound wave. Can travel both in solid and
liquid surface.
Secondary wave – the slower body wave, can not pass through liquid/ liquefied soil. Both vertical and horizontal
motions.
Surface wave - Most of the wave motion is located at the outside surface itself
two types
Love wave - it moves the ground side to side in a horizontal plane parallel to the Earth’s surface, but at right angles to
the direction of propagation
Rayleigh wave - move both vertically and horizontally in a vertical plane pointed in the direction in which the waves are
travelling, like rolling ocean waves

Ways Earthquakes can Damage Structures 

• by inertial forces generated by severe ground shaking.
• by earthquake induced fires.
• by changes in the physical properties of the foundation soils (e.g. consolidation, settling, and liquefaction).
• by direct fault displacement at the site of a structure.
• by landslides, or other surficial movements.
• by seismically induced water waves such as seismic sea waves (tsunamis) or fluid motions in reservoirs and lakes
(seiches).
• by large-scale tectonic changes in ground elevation. 

COMMON TERMS
accelerometer—a seismograph for measuring ground acceleration as a function of time.
active fault—a fault along which slip has occurred, either in historical or Holocene or Quaternary time, or earthquake
foci are located.
asperities (fault)—roughness on the fault surface subject to slip.
blind thrust—a thrust-fault deep in the crust with no or only indirect surface expression such as a fold structure.
body-wave magnitude—magnitude of an earthquake as estimated from the amplitude of body wave.
digital recording—a series of discrete numerical digits.
duration (of strong shaking)—the time Interval between the first and last peaks of strong ground motion above a
specified amplitude.
epicenter—the point on the Earth’s surface directly above the focus (or hypocenter) of an earthquake.
fault—a fracture or zone of fractures in rock along which the two sides have been displaced relative to each other
parallel to the fracture. The total fault off-set may range from centimeters to kilometers.
focal depth (of earthquakes)—the depth of the focus below the surface of the Earth.
intensity (of earthquakes)—a measure of ground shaking obtained from the damage done to structures built by
humans, changes in the Earth’s surface, and felt reports.
isoseismal—contour lines drawn to separate one level of seismic intensity from another.
liquefaction (of soil)—process of soil and sand behaving like a dense fluid rather than a wet solid mass during an
earthquake.
Love waves—seismic surface waves with only horizontal shear motion transverse to the direction of propagation.
magnitude (of earthquakes)—a measure of earthquake size, determined by taking the  common logarithm (base 10)
of the largest ground motion recorded during the arrival of a seismic wave type and applying a standard correction for
distance to the epicenter.
moment (of earthquakes)—a measure of earthquake size related to the leverage of the
forces (couples) across the area of the fault slip, equal to the rigidity of the rock times the area of faulting times the
amount of slip. Dimensions are dyne-cm (or Newton-meters).
moment magnitude—magnitude MW of an earthquake estimated from the seismic moment.
plate (tectonic)—a large, relatively rigid segment of the Earth’s lithosphere that moves in relation to other plates over
the deeper interior. Plates meet in convergence zones and separate at divergence zones.
plate tectonics—a geological model in which the Earth’s crust and uppermost mantle (the lithosphere) are divided
into a number of more-or-less rigid segments (plates).
prediction (of earthquakes)—the forecasting in time, place, and magnitude of an earthquake; the forecasting of
strong ground motions.
P wave—the primary or fastest wave traveling away from a seismic event through the rock and consisting of a train of
compressions and dilatations of the material.
Rayleigh waves—seismic surface waves with ground motion only in a vertical plane containing the direction of
propagation of the waves.
risk (seismic)—the probability of life and property loss from an earthquake hazard within a given time interval and
region.
scarp (fault)—a cliff or steep slope formed by displacement of the ground surface.
seismicity—the occurrence of earthquakes in space and time.
seismology—the study of earthquakes, seismic sources, and wave propagation through the Earth.
strong ground motion—the shaking of the ground near an earthquake source made up of large amplitude seismic
waves of various types.
S wave—the secondary seismic wave, traveling more slowly than the P wave and consisting of elastic vibrations
transverse to the direction of travel. It cannot propagate in a liquid.
TECTONIC EARTHQUAKES
• The geological explanation of the majority of earthquakes is in terms of what is called plate tectonics.
• Subduction
• Plate-edge earthquakes
 Earthquake-concentrated zones are called earthquake belts.
 2 major earthquake belts on the Earth:
• Circum-Pacific belt, which is very active, with 75% of earthquakes concentrated on it.
• The other one is the Eurasian or AlpideAsiatic, with about 22% of earthquakes occurring on it.
• Earthquakes on these two major belts are interplate earthquakes.
• The remaining 3% of the earthquakes occur inside the plates and are thus intraplate earthquakes.
• Intraplate earthquakes are also caused by plate movements.
continental earthquakes (intraplate earthquakes) have the following three features:
• They are less frequent and less concentrated
• They are more dangerous to humans
• The source mechanism varies and is more complicated
• can either be plate boundary related or mid plate (not related to plate edges)
•Have smaller rupture areas and more high frequency content than interplate earthquakes
• lower attenuation rate observed in intraplate as compared to interplate earthquakes .
FAULTING
• When two ground masses move with respect to one another, elastic strain energy due to tectonic processes is stored
and then released through the rupture of the interfacezone.
• The distorted blocks snap back towards equilibrium and an earthquake ground motion is produced. This process is
referred to as ‘elastic rebound’.
• The resulting fracture in the Earth’s crust is termed a ‘fault’.
• During the sudden rupture of the brittle crustal rock seismic waves are generated.
• These waves travel away from the source of the earthquake along the Earth’s outer layers. Their velocity depends on
the characteristics of the material through which they travel.
Faults
•drawn on geological maps as continuous or broken lines.
FAULTING
i. Dip slip faults: one block moves vertically with respect to the other.
• If the block underlying the fault plane or ‘foot wall’ moves up the dip and away from the block overhanging the fault
plane or ‘hanging wall’, normal faults are obtained. Tensile forces cause the shearing failure of normal faults.
• In turn, when the hanging wall moves upward in relation to the foot wall the faults are reversed; compressive forces
cause the failure. Thrust faults are reverse faults characterized by a very small dip
ii. Strike slip faults: the adjacent blocks move horizontally past one another.
• Strike slip can be right lateral or left lateral, depending on the sense of the relative motion of the blocks for an
observer located on one side of the fault line. The slip takes place along an essentially vertical fault plane and can be
caused by either compression or tension stresses.
• They are typical of transform zones.

Types of fault

1) Subduction zone interface (underthrust) faults, these result from tectonic seabed plates spreading apart and
thrusting under the adjacent continental plates, a phenomenon common to much of the circum-Pacific earthquake belt.
2) Compressive, overthrust faults- Compressive forces cause shearing failure forcing the upper portion upwards, as
occurred in San Fernando, California, in 1971 (also called reverse or thrustfaults).
3) Extensional faults- This is the inverse of the previous type, extensional strains pulling the upper block down the
sloping fault plane (also called normal faults).
4) Strike-slip faults - Relative horizontal displacement of the two sides of the fault takes place along an essentially
vertical fault plane, such as occurred at San Francisco in 1906 on the San Andreas fault (also called transcurrentfaults).

•The ‘focus’ or ‘hypocentre’ of an earthquake is the point under the surface where the rupture is said to have
originated.
• The projection of the focus on the surface is termed ‘epicentre’
•Foci are located by geographical coordinates, namely latitude and longitude, the focal depth and the origin or
occurrence time.
• The three types are also referred to as
shallow- range of 5–15 km,
Intermediate-20–50 km
deep focus- 300–700 km underground.
• Crustal earthquakes normally have depths of about 30 km or less.
PLATE BOUNDARIES

Divergent or rift zones: plates separate themselves from one another and either an effusion of magma occurs or the
lithosphere diverges from the interior of the Earth.
Convergent or subduction zones: adjacent plates converge and collide. A subduction process carries the slab‐like plate,
known as the ‘under‐thrusting plate’, into a dipping zone, also referred to as the ‘Wadati–Benioff zone’, as far downward
as 650–700 km into the Earth’s interior. Can be oceanic or continental
Transform zones or transcurrent horizontal slip: two plates glide past one another but without creating new
lithosphere or subducting old lithosphere. Transform faults can be found either in continental or oceanic lithosphere.

Plate tectonic theory provides a simple and general geological explanation for plate boundary or inter‐plate
earthquakes, which contribute 95% of worldwide seismic energy release.
Intensity is a non‐instrumental perceptibility measure of damage to structures, ground surface effects, for example
fractures, cracks and landslides, and human reactions to earthquake shaking. It is a descriptive method which has been
traditionally used to establish earthquake size, especially for pre‐instrumental events. It is a subjective damage map with
the location of the seismological stations. 18 Fundamentals of Earthquake Engineering evaluation metric because of its
qualitative nature, related to population density, familiarity with earthquake and type of constructions.
• It is a descriptive method which has been traditionally used to establish earthquake size, especially for pre
instrumental events.
•qualitatively as ‘‘the quality or condition of being intense’’
quantitatively as ‘‘magnitude, as of energy or a force per unit of area or time’’

(i) Mercalli–Cancani–Seiberg (MCS): 12‐level scale used in Southern Europe.

(ii) Modified Mercalli (MM): 12‐level scale proposed in 1931 by Wood and Neumann, who adapted the MCS scale to the
California data set. It is used in North America and several other countries.
(iii) Medvedev–Sponheuer–Karnik (MSK): 12‐level scale developed in Central and Eastern Europe and used in several
other countries.
(iv) European Macroseismic Scale (EMS): 12‐level scale adopted since 1998 in Europe. It is a development of the MM
scale.
(v) Japanese Meteorological Agency (JMA): 7‐level scale used in Japan. It has been revised over the years and has
recently been correlated to maximum horizontal acceleration of the ground.
Intensity scales are used to plot contour lines of equal intensity or ‘isoseismals’.

Magnitude is a quantitative measure of earthquake size and fault dimensions. It is based on the maximum amplitudes
of body or surface seismic waves. It is therefore an instrumental, quantitative and objective scale. The first attempts to
define magnitude scales were made in Japan by Wadati and in California by Richter in the 1930s.
•The first known seismic instrument, the Houfeng seismometer, made in the year AD 132 in the Late Han dynasty by the
ancient Chinese scientist Heng Zhang, successfully recorded an earthquake in AD 138.
• The modern type of seismograph started in the eighteenth century and includes three subsystems: sensor, amplifier
and recorder.
•In 1935, Richter first introduced the idea of magnitude to give a quantitative measure of an earthquake through
instrumental records. The Wood–Anderson torsional seismograph was in common use in southern California.

(i) Local (or Richter) magnitude (ML ) – measures the maximum seismic wave amplitude A (in microns) recorded on
standard Wood–Anderson seismographs located at a distance of 100 km from the earthquake epicenter.
(ii) Body wave magnitude (mb ) – measures the amplitude of P‐waves with a period of about 1.0 second, that is less than
10 km wavelengths.
(iii) Surface wave magnitude (MS ) – is a measure of the amplitudes of LR‐waves with a period of 20 seconds, that is
wavelength of about 60 km, which are common for very distant earthquakes.
(iv) Moment magnitude (MW) - accounts for the mechanism of shear that takes place at earthquake sources.

Intensity–Magnitude Relationships
• Intensity–magnitude relationships are essential for the use of historical earthquakes for which no instrumental records
exist.
• Several simple methods to convert intensity into magnitude have been proposed (e.g. Lee et al., 2003); most of which
exhibit large scatter because of the inevitable bias present in the definition of intensity (Ambraseys and Melville, 1982).
• Gutenberg and Richter (1956) proposed a linear relationship between local magnitude ML and epicentral intensity I0
for southern California, given by:

Measuring Earthquakes
• Earthquake size is expressed in several ways.

1. Quantitative or instrumental measurements; the latter can be either based on regional calibrations or
applicable worldwide.
2. Qualitative or Non instrumental measurements are of great importance for pre instrumental events and are
hence essential in the compilation of historical earthquake catalogues for purposes of hazard analysis