An investigation of multi-fault rupture scenarios using a variety of Coulomb stress modelling criteria: methods paper and full results

Abstract

A series of Coulomb stress models are used to simulate the independently-derived (Holden et al., 2011) rupture process of Mw 7.1 Darfield earthquake. The 7-fault source model of Beavan et al. (2012) is used for all models. Model differences include (i) differences in the static stress thresholds (0,1,5,10 MPa) that must be reached or exceeded to initiate rupture on a receiver fault, (ii) differences in whether fault-averaged, fault summative total, or maximum values of static stress on receiver faults are used with different threshold values from (i) to evaluate whether rupture proceeds or not, and (iii) whether rupture initiates only on the fault with the maximum static stress value (i.e., ..