Influence of fault system geometry and slip rates on earthquake triggering and recurrence variability, insights from Coulomb stress interactions during historical earthquake sequences in Italy

Abstract

We investigate the Coulomb stress changes due to 30 strong earthquakes occurring on normal faults since 1509 A.D. in Calabria, Italy, including the influence of both coseismic and interseismic loading in our modelling. We compare the results to existing studies of stress interaction from the Central and Southern Apennines, Italy. The three normal fault systems have different geometries and long-term slip-rates. The Central Apennines hosts a complex fault system, with many faults across strike, so that when an earthquake occurs, many of the surrounding faults experience a stress decrease. The Southern Apennines and Calabria have a simpler geometry, with fewer faults, and faults are located predominantly along strike, therefore when an earthquake occurs the dominant process on the neighbouring faults is stress increase. We investigate how stress transfer may influence the occurrence of future earthquakes and what factors may govern the variability in earthquake recurrence in different fault systems. Within the analysed time period, the Calabrian, Central Apennines, and Southern Apennines fault systems have 91%, 73% and 70% of faults with a mean positive cumulative Coulomb stress change, respectively; this is due to fewer faults across strike, more across strike stress reductions, and greater along-strike spacing in the three regions respectively. In regions with close along strike spacing or few faults across strike, such as Calabria and Southern Apennines, the stress loading history is mostly dominated by interseismic loading and most faults are positively stressed before an earthquake occur on them (96% of all faults that ruptured in Calabria; 94% of faults in the Southern Apennines), and some of the strongest earthquakes occur on faults with the highest mean cumulative stress of all faults prior to the earthquake. In the Central Apennines, where across strike interactions are the predominant process, 79% of the earthquakes occur on faults that are positively stressed. The results highlight that fault system geometry plays a central role in characterizing the stress evolution associated with earthquake recurrence, and can possibly influence the occurrence of propagating triggered earthquake sequences.