Analyses of pseudotachylyte from Hole-B of Taiwan Chelungpu Fault Drilling Project (TCDP); their implications for seismic slip behaviors during the 1999 Chi-Chi earthquake

Abstract

The seismic slip behavior during the 1999 Chi-Chi, Taiwan, earthquake ( M w 7.6) was contrastive between the northern and southern segments of the activated Chelungpu fault; large, fast and smooth slips with large stress drop in the north, while smaller, slower and irregular slips with smaller stress drop in the south. We analyzed the pseudotachylyte samples recovered from 1194 m, 1243 m and 1314 m depths of Hole-B of Taiwan Chelungpu fault Drilling Project (TCDP) to reveal the spatial difference in friction mechanism. All pseudotachylyte layers are thin (0.7–2.8 cm), the volume fraction of protoliths is very large (more than 63%), and the estimated temperature distribution is very heterogeneous from ca. 750–1750 °C. These observations suggest that these pseudotachylyte melts were in the partial melting regime of Montgomery [Montgomery, R.S., 1976. Friction and wear at high sliding speeds. Wear 36, 275–298] where friction coefficient is abnormally large. Similar pseudotachylyte was found already in the core sample from 175 m depth of the Nanto borehole penetrating the southern fault. Since both pseudotachylyte samples from the two boreholes are older than the 1999 Chi-Chi event and have been uplifted from depths farther down-dip of their current locations, it is likely that recent seismic ruptures also would have encountered these mechanical barriers of viscous melt patches at deeper parts in the north than in the south. Elastohydrodynamic lubrication of clayey gouge worked effectively at the shallower parts of the northern segment, however there is no evidence that it played an important role in the south. These differences are the plausible causes of the contrastive local slip behaviors during the Chi-Chi earthquake.