USE OF FAULT DISPLACEMENT VECTOR TO IDENTIFY FUTURE ZONES OF SEISMICITY: AN EXAMPLE FROM THE EARTHQUAKES OF NEPAL HIMALAYAS

Earthquakes occur due to fault slip in the subsurface. They can occur either as interplate or intraplate earthquakes. The region of study is the Nepal Himalayas that defines the boundary of Indian-Eurasian plate and houses the focus of the most devastating earthquakes. The aim of the study was to analyze all the earthquakes that occurred in the Nepal Himalayas upto May 12, 2015 earthquake in order to mark the regions still under stress and vulnerable for future earthquakes. Three different fault systems in the Nepal Himalayas define the tectonic set up of the area. They are: (1) Main Frontal Thrust(MFT), (2) Main Central Thrust(MCT) and (3) Main Boundary Thrust(MBT) that extend from NW to SE. Most of the earthquakes were observed to occur between the MBT and MCT. Since the thrust faults are dipping towards NE, the focus of most of the earthquakes lies on the MBT. The methodology includes estimating the dip of the fault by considering the depths of different earthquake events and their corresponding distance from the MBT.

In order to carry out stress analysis on the fault, the beach ball diagrams associated with the different earthquakes were plotted on a map. Earthquakes in the NW and central region of the fault zone were associated with reverse fault slip while that on the South-Eastern part were associated with a strike slip component. The direction of net slip on the fault associated with the different earthquakes was known and from this a 3D slip diagram of the fault was constructed. The regions vulnerable for future earthquakes in the Nepal Himalaya were demarcated on the 3D slip diagram of the fault. Such zones were marked owing to the fact that the slips due to earthquakes cause the adjoining areas to come under immense stress and this stress is directly proportional to the amount of slip occuring on the fault. These vulnerable zones were in turn projected on the map to show their position and are predicted to contain the epicenter of the future earthquakes.