Seismotectonic setting of the Karadere-Duzce branch of the North Anatolian Fault Zone between the 1999 Izmit and Duzce ruptures from analysis of Izmit aftershock focal mechanisms

Abstract

We investigate aftershock focal mechanisms along the eastern part of the Izmit M-w = 7.4 August 17, 1999 rupture zone during the time period August 22, 1999-October 17, 1999. Two spatial clusters of aftershock activity are analyzed representing the Karadere Fault (KF) and the Duzce Area (DA). Based on an aftershock hypocenter catalogue restricted to events with horizontal and vertical errors 10 km) events. North and east of the easternmost end of the Karadere Fault we observe a high variance in stress field orientation correlated with lower b-values. While the Karadere Fault reflects a predominant dextral strike-slip regime with normal faulting components, the Duzce Area further to the East that also hosted the forthcoming M-w = 7.2 mainshock 87 days after the Izmit earthquake can be subdivided into a dominantly NE-SW extensional normal faulting regime below the Duzce Basin (DB) and a first-order strike-slip regime along the western Duzce Fault (DF). We conclude that the Duzce Basin was set under tension by the Izmit rupture and partly released the slip deficit by extensional faulting on Karadere Fault parallel to the coseismic displacement. At the same time this area and in particular the Duzce Fault that bounds the Duzce Basin to the south reflects mostly strike-slip events representing a major asperity along the North Anatolian Fault Zone (NAFZ) before initiating the Duzce rupture 87 days after the Izmit event. (C) 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.