GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH LETTERS, VOL. 38, L04306, doi:10.

1029/2010GL046373, 2011

Delayed triggering of microearthquakes by multiple surface waves

circling the Earth
Zhigang Peng,1 Chunquan Wu,1 and Chastity Aiken1
Received 1 December 2010; revised 16 January 2011; accepted 24 January 2011; published 24 February 2011.

[ 1 ] It is well known that direct surface waves of large Gn for Love waves, and Rn for Rayleigh waves. The index n
earthquakes are capable of triggering shallow earthquakes denotes the time taken to circle the Earth, with the odd
and deep tremor at long‐range distances. However, it is number (G1, G3, etc) corresponding to the shortest path
not clear whether multiple surface waves circling the Earth between the source and receiver and the even number (G2,
could also trigger/modulate seismic activities. Here we con- G4, etc) denoting the opposite path. Figure S1 of the
duct a systematic search of remotely triggered microearth- auxiliary material shows the record sections for vertical
quakes near the Coso Geothermal Field in central California displacement seismograms generated by the Mw 8.8 earth-
following the 2010 Mw 8.8 Chile earthquake. We find a statis- quake that occurred offshore Maule, Chile on 2010/02/27.1
tically significant increase of microearthquakes in the first The R1 to R4 Rayleigh waves are clearly visible, and have
few hours after the Chile mainshock. These observations of peak amplitudes on the order of a few fraction of a centimeter.
apparently delayed earthquake triggering do not follow the The associated peak ground velocities for the multiple surface
Omori‐law decay with time since the largest ML 3.5 event waves is on the order of 0.01 cm/s, which corresponds to a
occurred during the large‐amplitude Love waves. Instead, dynamic stress of ∼1 kPa (assuming a nominal phase
they are better correlated with the first three groups of multi- velocity of 4 km/s and shear rigidity of 40 GPa). These
ple surface waves (G1 − R1, G2 − R2, and G3). Our observation numbers are close to the apparent triggering threshold of a
provides an alternative explanation of delayed triggering of few kPa found from recent systematic studies of triggered
microearthquakes at long‐range distances, at least in the first microearthquakes and tremor around the world [Brodsky
few hours after large earthquakes. Citation: Peng, Z., C. Wu, and Prejean, 2005; Peng et al., 2009; Aiken et al., 2010;
and C. Aiken (2011), Delayed triggering of microearthquakes by K. Chao et al., Remote triggering of non‐volcanic tremor
multiple surface waves circling the Earth, Geophys. Res. Lett., 38, around Taiwan, submitted to Geophysical Journal Interna-
L04306, doi:10.1029/2010GL046373. tional, 2010], suggesting that the later arriving multiple sur-
face waves could have the potential of triggering/modulating
1. Introduction microearthquakes.
[4] To test this hypothesis, we examine the continuous
[2] Recent studies have shown that large earthquakes are seismic recordings near the Coso Geothermal Field (CGF)
capable of triggering microearthquakes and deep non‐ in central California (Figure 1) ∼12 hours before and after
volcanic tremor at distances up to thousands of kilometers the 2010 Mw 8.8 Chile earthquake. We choose this region
[Hill and Prejean, 2007; Peng and Gomberg, 2010, and mainly because it is one of the most seismically active
references therein]. Many triggered seismic events occur regions in California [Bhattacharyya and Lees, 2002], and is
instantaneously during the large‐amplitude surface waves of repeatedly triggered by large regional and teleseismic
distant earthquakes [Velasco et al., 2008; Peng et al., 2009; earthquakes [e.g., Prejean et al., 2004; Aiken et al., 2010].
Wu et al., 2011], and are generally consistent with frictional In particular, Peng et al. [2010] found 4 ML ≥ 2 events listed
failure on critically‐stressed faults under the Coulomb failure in the Southern California Seismic Network (SCSN) catalog
criteria [Hill, 2008, 2010; Peng et al., 2010]. However, in during the passage of the teleseismic waves of the 2010
some cases, elevated seismicity continues long after the Chile mainshock, including an ML 3.5 event that coincides
passage of the surface waves, and the mechanism of such with the 200‐s mantle Love wave. In this work, we extend
delayed triggering is still unclear [Hill and Prejean, 2007]. our previous study by manually picking local earthquakes
Some have invoked redistribution of pore fluids [Brodsky and from band‐pass filtered seismograms in a longer time frame
Prejean, 2005], altered frictional contacts within fault zones and examining the correlations with the multiple surface
[Parsons, 2005], or triggered aseismic creep events [Shelly waves produced by the 2010 Chile mainshock.
et al., 2011], while others suggested that they are simply
aftershocks of the instantaneously triggered events [Brodsky, 2. Analysis Procedure
2006].
[3] Due to the finiteness of the Earth, surface waves [5] The analysis procedure generally follows that of Peng
produced by large earthquakes can circle the globe many et al. [2007] and is briefly described here. We use the
times [e.g., Stein and Wysession, 2003]. They are denoted as continuous three‐component seismograms recorded by the
broadband station JRC2 in the CGF in this study. We first
remove the instrument response, integrate into displacement,
1
School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, Georgia Institute of
demean and detrend the displacement data, and then apply a
Technology, Atlanta, Georgia, USA. two‐pass 4th‐order 2–16 Hz Butterworth filter to remove
1
Copyright 2011 by the American Geophysical Union. Auxiliary materials are available in the HTML. doi:10.1029/
0094‐8276/11/2010GL046373 2010GL046373.

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catalog. The magnitudes and log10(amplitudes) follow the

1‐1 slope, and the best fitting relationship is M = 0.977 ×
log10(A) + 6.32, where M is the inferred magnitude, and A
is the peak displacement in cm. We use this relationship to
convert the peak displacements of all events into magni-
tudes, without considering the effects of epicentral dis-
tances. The median value of the log10 envelope function is
−7.32, which roughly corresponds to the inferred magnitude
−0.83, denoting the smallest possible events we can identify
from this procedure. The manually picked events generally
follow the Gutenberg‐Richter frequency‐size relationship,
but the corresponding b‐values (Figure 2c) from both least‐
squares fitting and maximum‐likelihood estimates are very
low (<0.5). These numbers, however, are marginally within
the 1‐standard deviations of the b‐values estimated directly
from the events listed in the SCSN catalog around the
occurrence time of the Chile mainshock (Figure S2), sug-
gesting that the low b‐value found in this study is not purely
an artifact of misidentification of smaller events. The mag-
nitude of completeness Mc value, which is the largest
magnitude between those determined from the maximum
curvature (MAXC) and the goodness‐of‐fit (GOF) methods
Figure 1. Map view of the study region around the Coso [Wiemer and Wyss, 2000], is −0.4. We only use 99 events
Geothermal Field in central California. Seismic stations with M ≥ Mc value in the subsequent analysis.
belonging to the Southern California Seismic Network
(SCSN) are denoted as blue triangles. Gray dots signify
earthquakes since 1999 listed in the SCSN catalog. The
3. Relationship Between Local Events
earthquake catalogs are downloaded from Southern California and Multiple Surface Waves
Earthquake Data Center (SCEDC) within a rectangular area [7] Figure 3 shows a comparison of the envelope func-
(longitudes between −118.25° and −117.5°, and latitudes tions, manually picked events, and the displacement seis-
between 35.75° and 36.25°) that bounds our study region. mograms recorded at station JRC2 around the Chile
Green stars represent 15 earthquakes that occurred 12 hours mainshock. The time windows associated with the group
before and after the 2010 Mw 8.8 Chile main shock. The
inset shows a cartoon illustrating the multiple surface waves
circling the Earth from the source (yellow star) to receiver
(blue triangle).

long‐period teleseismic signals. We compute the envelopes

of the band‐pass filtered seismograms, smooth the envelope
by a mean operator with a half width of 50 data points
(0.5 s), and finally stack the three‐component envelopes.
Next, we identify earthquakes as high‐frequency impulsive
seismic energy in the 2–16 Hz band‐pass filtered seismo-
grams and double picks in the envelope that correspond to
the P and S arrivals. To ensure that the identified events are
of local origin, we require that the S − P time for each event
is less than 5 s, which roughly corresponds to the epicentral
distance of ∼40 km. Next, we find the peak amplitude for
each event and use the time corresponding to the peak
amplitude as a proxy for the event origin time, as was done
by Peng et al. [2007]. The actual origin time would be a few Figure 2. (a) The 2–16 Hz band‐pass filtered envelope
seconds earlier, but such a difference is negligible in the function at station JRC2 showing manually picked local
following analysis. Overall, we have identified a total of earthquakes (open circles) 12 hours before and after the
116 events (Figure 2a) within 12 hour before and after the 2010 Mw 8.8 Chile mainshock. The large solid circles mark
theoretical P arrival of the Chile mainshock (742.4 s after the events that are also listed in the SCSN catalog. The ver-
the origin time 2010/02/27, 06:34:14 UTC), as predicted tical dashed line marks the predicted P arrival. (b) The mag-
by the iasp91 model [Kennett and Engdahl, 1991]. nitudes for 15 events that are listed in the catalog versus
[6] It is well known that a ten‐fold increase in amplitude their peak amplitudes. The dark line marks the least‐squares
generally corresponds to one unit increase in magnitude. fitting of the data. (c) Cumulative (blue square) and discrete
Therefore, the measured peak amplitudes of the 116 man- (black circle) frequency‐magnitude distributions for all the
ually picked events provide good estimation for their hand‐picked events. The black solid and red dashed lines
magnitudes. Figure 2b shows the magnitude‐amplitude mark the b‐value fit from least‐squares and maximum‐
relationship for 15 events that are also listed in the SCSN likelihood methods, respectively.
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perform two types of statistical analysis. First, we compare

the seismicity rate immediately before and after the P wave
of the Chile main shock and compute the b‐statistic value
[e.g., Kilb et al., 2002], which is a measure of the difference
between the observed number of events after the main shock
and the expected number from the averaged rate before the
main shock. The b‐value for all the events is 3.4, while the
b‐value for events above the Mc value is 2.4. Both numbers
are slightly above 2, suggesting that there is a moderate
increase of seismic activity near Coso following the Chile
main shock.
[9] Next, we compute the b‐value using a small time
window of 1000 s, and slide every 500 s after the teleseismic
P waves. The choice of the window length is somewhat
subjective, which reflects a compromise between a long‐
enough window for stable measurements and short‐enough
window for detailed information. The results from this and
other choices of time windows ranging from 500, 2000, to
3000 s (Figure S3) show that the b‐values generally track
the number of events and are above 2 during the first three
groups of the multiple surface waves, suggesting a statisti-
cally significant triggering. The b‐value during the G4 and
Figure 3. (a) The sliding‐window b‐values measured from
R4 waves is less than 2, and hence the apparent triggering is
all manually picked events (red circles) above the magnitude
not well established. In addition, the expected b‐value
of completeness Mc = −0.4 and envelope functions (blue
outside the multiple surface wave periods is −1.02 when no
squares) after the Chile main shock. The horizontal gray
events occur (Figure S3).
lines mark the b‐values of ±2. The b‐values for the enve-
[10] In the second method, we directly measure the b‐value
lope functions are clipped at 10 (with true values marked)
from the band‐pass filtered envelope functions [Jiang et al.,
for plotting purpose. The vertical gray lines correspond to
2010] by summing the log10 amplitudes in different time
the time windows that show statistically significant trigger-
periods that are above 9 times the maximum absolute
ing (i.e., b‐value > 2). (b) The 2–16 Hz band‐pass filtered
deviation (MAD) of the envelope functions (i.e., above
envelope function showing local earthquakes (red circles)
around Coso. The blue dashed line marks the 9 times the
Median Absolute Deviation (MAD). (c) The instrument‐
corrected three‐component displacement seismograms
showing the teleseismic body waves, and multiple‐surface
waves generated by the 2010 Chile mainshock. The vertical
dashed line marks the predicted arrival of the P wave. The
short red, green, blue and black lines on the top mark the
arrival times that correspond to the group velocities of 5,
4.5, 4, and 3.5 km/s.

velocities of 4–5 km/s and 3.5–4.5 km/s roughly correspond

to the arrivals of the Gn and Rn waves, respectively. We find
that nine events occurred between the teleseismic S wave
and immediately after the G1 and R1 waves (∼1300–∼3500 s,
with 4 listed in the SCSN catalog), as reported by Peng
et al. [2010]. This is followed by a relative quiescence
between ∼3500 and ∼5600 s. There is a strong burst of
activity between ∼5600 and ∼7500 s during the G2 waves,
and two earthquakes during the subsequent R2 waves
between ∼7500 and ∼9000 s. Following these events, there
is another brief period of quiescence, and then a strong burst
of activity during and immediately after the G3 waves
between ∼10500 and ∼12500 s. No clear seismic activity is
observed during the R3 waves (i.e., from ∼12500 to Figure 4. Seismicity rate before (blue) and after (red) the
∼14000 s). After that, we could not identify any further ML 3.5 earthquake that occurred during the large‐amplitude
correlations with the subsequent Gn and Rn waves. A Love wave. The horizontal green line marks the average rate
swarm‐like activity occurred about ∼27000 s after the before the ML 3.5 earthquake, and the solid and dashed lines
mainshock and does not appear to have any correlations show the reference Omori’s law decay rate with p = 1 and
with the teleseismic surface waves (Figure 2). 0.5, respectively. The short red, green, blue and black lines
[8] To further quantify the relationship between the on the top mark the arrival times that correspond to the
manually picked events and multiple surface waves, we group velocities of 5, 4.5, 4, and 3.5 km/s.
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−6.6, or inferred magnitude of −0.13). The resulting b‐ sponds to a dynamic stress of 1.7 kPa. This value is close to
values (Figure 3a) show similar patterns, although the the aforementioned triggering thresholds for tremor and
fluctuations are much larger due to the heavy weight microearthquakes found elsewhere [Peng et al., 2009; Aiken
towards large‐magnitude events. Nevertheless, it is evident et al., 2010; Chao et al., submitted manuscript, 2010],
from both approaches that there is an apparent correlation suggesting that the lack of triggering by later arriving sur-
between the multiple surface waves of the Chile earthquake face waves could be due to their small amplitudes.
and the local seismicity near Coso, at least for the first three [15] An interesting distance range for observing triggering
groups. by multiple surface waves is at 180° (antipodal distance) or
[11] The largest magnitude earthquake during our study 360° (epicenter). Because the surface wave amplitudes are
period is an ML 3.5 event that occurred during the large‐ larger at these distance ranges due to a superposition effect
amplitude Love wave [Peng et al., 2010]. To check if the (e.g., Figure S1), we would expect to see higher potential of
subsequent events could simply be aftershocks of this event triggering by multiple surface waves. Recently, Lin [2010]
[Brodsky, 2006], we compute the seismicity rate relative to found that one of the large aftershocks of the 2008 Mw
this ML 3.5 based on a sliding window technique with a 7.9 Wenchuan earthquake occurred during the large‐
fixed data window of 5 events [Peng et al., 2007]. Figure 4 amplitude ScS wave, and proposed that teleseismic waves
shows that while the events during the G1 and R1 waves returning back to the epicentral region could modulate
could be considered as aftershocks of the ML 3.5 event aftershock activity. It remains to be tested whether the
(however, with only 3 data points, it is not clear), the events multiple surface waves returning back to the epicentral
occurred during the subsequent multiple surface waves and region have the same potential of triggering additional
the swarm period do not follow the Omori law decay. aftershocks. This is an interesting subject that will be ana-
Hence, these events could not be simply explained as lyzed in a follow‐up study.
aftershocks of the directly triggered events.
[16] Acknowledgments. The seismic data and earthquake catalog
4. Discussions used in this study are downloaded from the Southern California Earth-
quake Data Center (SCEDC). We thank Aaron Velasco, an anonymous
[12] In this short note we showed that multiple surface reviewer, and the editor Ruth A. Harris for their useful comments. This
waves from the 2010 Mw 8.8 Chile earthquake trigger/ study was supported by the National Science Foundation through award
EAR‐0956051.
modulate microearthquake activity at the CGF in central
California. To our knowledge, this is the first evidence of
earthquake triggering by multiple surface waves, in addition
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