General pattern of seismotectonic dislocation and the earthquake- generating stress field in central Europe between the Alps and the North Sea.

Abstract

Thirty reliable fault-plane solutions from earthquakes which occurred between 1975 and 1982 in central Europe between the Alps and the North Sea have been used to derive the general pattern of seismotectonic dislocations and the characteristic features of the earthquake generating field in the Rhenish massif and the surrounding region. In the southern part of the upper Rhine graben, the Swabian Jura and in the western Vosges Mountains, strike slip mechanisms are predominant, whereas in the northernmost part of the upper Rhine graben, the Rhenish massif and the lower Rhine embayment tensional dip-slip dislocations along NW-SE-trending fault planes are typical. Seismotectonic evidence strongly suggests that an active rift zone separates the Rhenish massif along a line between the lower Rhine embayment and the upper Rhine graben. -J.M.H.