Implication of fault interaction to seismic hazard assessment in Sichuan-Yunnan provinces of southeastern China

Abstract

Coulomb stress changes associated with the strong earthquakes that occurred since 1904 in Sichuan and Yunnan provinces of China are investigated. The study area comprises the most active seismic fault zones in the Chinese mainland and suffers from both strong and frequent events. The tectonic regime of this rhombic-shaped area is affected by the eastern extrusion of the Tibetan highland due to the collision of Eurasian Plate against the Indian lithospheric block along the Himalayan convergent zone. This movement is accommodated on major strike-slip intraplate fault zones that strike in an E-W direction. The gradual 90° clockwise rotation of the faults in the study area contributes to the complexity of the stress field. The seismic hazard assessment in this region is attempted by calculating the change of the Coulomb Failure Function (ΔCFF) arising from both the coseismic slip of strong events (MS≥6.5) and the stress built-up by continuous tectonic loading on major regional faults. At every step of the stress evolutionary model an examination of possible triggering of each next strong event is made and the model finally puts in evidence the fault segments that apt to fail in an impending strong event, thus providing future seismic hazard evaluation.