Field observations of seismic velocity changes caused by shaking-induced damage and healing due to mesoscopic nonlinearity

Abstract

To investigate temporal seismic velocity changes due to earthquake related processes and environmental forcing in Northern Chile, we analyse 8 yr of ambient seismic noise recorded by the Integrated Plate Boundary Observatory Chile (IPOC). By autocorrelating the ambient seismic noise field measured on the vertical components, approximations of the Green's functions are retrieved and velocity changes are measured with Coda Wave Interferometry. At station PATCX, we observe seasonal changes in seismic velocity caused by thermal stress as well as transient velocity reductions in the frequency range of 4–6 Hz. Sudden velocity drops occur at the time of mostly earthquake-induced ground shaking and recover over a variable period of time. We present an empirical model that describes the seismic velocity variations based on continuous observations of the local ground acceleration. The model assumes that not only the shaking of large earthquakes causes velocity drops, but any small vibrations continuously induce minor velocity variations that are immediately compensated by healing in the steady state. We show that the shaking effect is accumulated over time and best described by the integrated envelope of the ground acceleration over the discretization interval of the velocity measurements, which is one day. In our model, the amplitude of the velocity reduction as well as the recovery time are proportional to the size of the excitation. This model with two free scaling parameters fits the data of the shaking induced velocity variation in remarkable detail. Additionally, a linear trend is observed that might be related to a recovery process from one or more earthquakes before our measurement period. A clear relationship between ground shaking and induced velocity reductions is not visible at other stations. We attribute the outstanding sensitivity of PATCX to ground shaking and thermal stress to the special geological setting of the station, where the subsurface material consists of relatively loose conglomerate with high pore volume leading to a stronger nonlinearity compared to the other IPOC stations.