Short-Period Rupture Process of the 2010 Mw8.8 Maule Earthquake in Chile

Abstract

The 2010 Maule earthquake is one of the largest events ever recorded with modern instruments. We used the continuous GPS (cGPS) records to invert for the kinematic rupture process using an elliptical sub-patch approximation. In agreement with previous inversions, the largest slip is found in the northern part of the rupture zone. By cross-correlating signals from cGPS and strong motion records (SM) located in the northern part of the rupture zone, we identified two distinct seismic pulses. Using the arrival time of these pulses, we propose a short-period (<20 s) rupture process, the zone where these pulses are generated is situated near 35.5°S, in agreement with the area with the highest seismic slip and maximum observed intensity. Finally, we compare the strong motion records at the same sites for the 1985 Mw8 Valparaíso earthquake and the Maule earthquake. We found that spectral contents and duration of the records of these two events were very similar. Thus, at least in the northern part of the rupture, the Maule earthquake radiated high frequency waves like an Mw8 earthquake.