Fmax and fault zone property of Lushan earthquake of 20 April 2013, Sichuan, China

Abstract

In this study, we determined fmax from near-field accelerograms of the Lushan earthquake of April 20, 2013 through spectra analysis. The result shows that the values of fmax derived from five different seismography stations are very close though these stations roughly span about 100 km along the strike. This implies that the cause of fmax is mainly the seismic source process rather than the site effect. Moreover, according to the source–cause model of Papageorgiou and Aki (Bull Seism Soc Am 73:693–722, 1983), we infer that the cohesive zone width of the rupture of the Lushan earthquake is about 204 with an uncertainty of 13 m. We also find that there is a significant bulge between 30 and 45 Hz in the amplitude spectra of accelerograms of stations 51YAL and 51QLY, and we confirm that it is due to seismic waves’ reverberation of the sedimentary soil layer beneath these stations.