Skip to main content

Volume 60 Supplement 11

Special Issue: Special Section for the 2007 Chuetsu-oki, Niigata, Japan, Earthquake

Coseismic deformation due to the 2007 Chuetsu-oki earthquake (Mw= 6.8)

Abstract

Global Positioning System (GPS) and Synthetic Aperture Radar Interferometry (InSAR) detected substantial ground deformation due to the 2007 Chuetsu-oki earthquake (Mw = 6.8); GPS observation detected a horizontal deformation of up to about 170 mm and subsidence of up to 30 mm, and InSAR detected up to 290 mm of line-of-sight changes. A fault model is proposed to fit the ground deformation field as well as the aftershock distribution. Our model shows that a northwest-dipping fault to the north and a southeast-dipping fault to the south, consistent with the aftershock distribution, fits well with the observed data. However, our model also suggests that the modeled faults are likely to extend to shallower depths, where aftershocks are terminated. Combining our model with the subsurface structure suggests that the earthquake rupture initiated at depth and propagated into shallower depths that are not capable of nucleating an earthquake because of the presence of unconsolidated sediments.

References

  • Basu, A. and L. N. Frazer, Rapid-determination of the critical-temperature in Simulated Annealing inversion, Nature, 249, 1409–1412, 1990.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bürgmann, R., P. A. Rosen, and E. J. Fielding, Synthetic aperture radar interferometry to measure Earth’s surface topography and its deformation, Ann. Rev. Earth Planet. Sci., 28, 169–209, 2000.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Cervelli, P., M. H. Murray, P. Segall, Y. Aoki, and T. Kato, Estimating source parameters from deformation data, with an application to the March 1997 earthquake swarm off the Izu Peninsula, Japan, J. Geophys. Res., 106, 11,217–11,237, 2001.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Cyranoski, D., Quake shuts world’s largest nuclear plant, Nature, 448, 392–393, 2007.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Du, Y., P. Segall, and H. Gao, Quasi-static dislocations in three dimensional inhomogeneous media, Geophys. Res. Lett., 24, 2347–2350, 1997.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Heki, K., S. Miyazaki, H. Takahashi, M. Kasahara, F. Kimata, S. Miura, N. F. Vasilenko, A. Ivashchenko, and K. D. An, The Amurian Plate motion and current plate kinematics in eastern Asia, J. Geophys. Res., 104, 24,147–24,155, 1999.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hikima, K. and K. Koketsu, Source process of the 2007 Chuetsu-oki earthquake inferred from far field waveforms and strong motions, Seismol. Soc. Jpn. Fall Meeting, Abstract P1-085, 2007 (in Japanese).

    Google Scholar 

  • Hirata, N., Introduction to the special section for the 2004 Mid-Niigata Prefecture Earthquake, Earth Planets Space, 57, i, 2005.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Jónsson, S., H. Zebker, P. Segall, and F. Amelung, Fault slip distribution of the 1999 Mw 7.1 Hector Mine, California, earthquake, estimated from satellite radar and GPS measurements, Bull. Seismol. Soc. Am., 92, 1377–1389, 2002.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kato, A., S. Sakai, N. Hirata, E. Kurashimo, T. Iidaka, T. Iwasaki, and T. Kanazawa, Imaging the seismic structure and stress field in the source region of the 2004 mid-Niigata Prefecture Earthquake: Structural zones of weakness, seismogenic stress concentration by ductile flow, J. Geophys. Res., 111, B08308, doi:10.1029/2005JB004016, 2006.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kato, A. and The Research Team of aftershock observations for the 2004 mid-Niigata Prefecture Earthquake, High-resolution aftershock observations in the source region of the 2004 mid-Niigata Prefecture Earthquake, Earth Planets Space, 59, 923–928, 2007.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kato, A., S. Sakai, E. Kurashimo, T. Igarashi, T. Iidaka, N. Hirata, T. Iwasaki, T. Kanazawa, and Group for the aftershock observations of the 2007 Niigataken Chuetsu-oki Earthquake, Imaging heterogeneous velocity structures and complex aftershock distributions in the source region of the 2007 Niigataken Chuetsu-oki Earthquake by a dense seismic observation, Earth Planets Space, 60, this issue, 1111–1116, 2

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lohman, R. B. and M. Simons, Some thoughts on the use of In-SAR data to constrain models of surface deformation: Noise structure and data downsampling, Geochem. Geophys. Geosyst., 6, Q01007, doi:10.1029/2004GC000841, 2005.

    Google Scholar 

  • Nomale, D., Quake underscores shaky understanding of ground forces, Science, 317, 438–439, 2007.

    Google Scholar 

  • Okada, Y., Surface deformation due to shear and tensile faults in a half-space, Bull. Seismol. Soc. Am., 75, 1135–1154, 1985.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rosenqvist, A., M. Shimada, N. Ito, and M. Watanabe, ALOS PALSAR: A Pathfinder Mission for Global-Scale Monitoring of the Environment, IEEE Trans. Geosci. Remote Sensing, 45, 3307–3316, 2007.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ruff, L. and H. Kanamori, The rupture process and asperity distribution of 3 great earthquakes from long-period diffracted P-waves, Phys. Earth Planet. Inter., 31, 202–230, 1983.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Sagiya, T., A decade of GEONET: 1994—2003—The continuous GPS observation in Japan and its impact on earthquake studies—, Earth Planets Space, 56, xix–xli, 2004.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Sagiya, T., S. Miyazaki, and T. Tada, Continuous GPS array and present-day crustal deformation of Japan, Pure Appl. Geophys., 157, 2303–2322, 2000.

    Google Scholar 

  • Samet, H. and R. E. Webber, Hierarchical data structures and algorithms for computer graphics. I. Foundamentals, IEEE Comp. Graphics Appl., 8, 48–68, 1988.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Sato, H. and N. Kato, Relationship between geologic structure and the source fault of the 2004 Mid-Niigata Prefecture Earthquake, central Japan, Earth Planets Space, 57, 453–457, 2005.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Scholz, C. H., The mechanics of earthquakes and faulting, 2nd ed., 471 pp, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK, 2002.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Segall, P. and J. L. Davis, GPS applications for geodynamics and earthquake studies, Ann. Rev. Earth Planet. Sci., 25, 301–336, 1997.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Shoji, T. and H. Kitaura, Statistical and geostatistical analysis of rainfall in central Japan, Comp. Geosci., 32, 1007–1024, 2006.

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Yosuke Aoki.

Rights and permissions

Open Access  This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made.

The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder.

To view a copy of this licence, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Aoki, Y., Furuya, M. & Kato, T. Coseismic deformation due to the 2007 Chuetsu-oki earthquake (Mw= 6.8). Earth Planet Sp 60, 1075–1080 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1186/BF03353139

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Revised:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1186/BF03353139

Key words