Slow Earthquake and Water

Abstract

Water affects many geological and geophysical phenomena, for example, earthquake generation. Recently, anomalous earthquakes, which are strongly related to fluid have been detected in a subduction zone by densely distributed geodetic and seismic observation networks. These are called slow earthquakes and are divided into many categories of earthquakes. The long-term slow slip in Tokai or Bungo Channel, which occurs at the subducting plate interface, is a phenomenon with a very long time-constant ranging from months to years. At the deeper part of the long-term slow slip, the short-term slow slip occurs with a period of several days associated with the non-volcanic deep low-frequency tremor in the transition zone on the plate interface in southwest Japan. These slow earthquakes might be related to fluid liberated from the down-going slab by dehydration process. At the shallower part of the subducting plate interface, the very low-frequency earthquakes occur in the accretionary prism near the Nankai trough. These slow earthquakes indicate a weakening of frictional strength at the plate interface and low stress drop due to the existence of fluid.