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A fault plane is the plane that represents the fracture surface of a fault. A fault trace or fault line is a place where the fault can be seen or mapped on the surface. A fault trace is also the line commonly plotted on geologic maps to represent a fault. [3] [4] A fault zone is a cluster of parallel faults.
A tectonic earthquake begins by an initial rupture at a point on the fault surface, a process known as nucleation. The scale of the nucleation zone is uncertain, with some evidence, such as the rupture dimensions of the smallest earthquakes, suggesting that it is smaller than 100 m while other evidence, such as a slow component revealed by low-frequency spectra of some earthquakes, suggest ...
The longest earthquake ruptures on strike-slip faults, like the San Andreas Fault (1857, 1906), the North Anatolian Fault in Turkey , and the Denali Fault in Alaska , are about half to one third as long as the lengths along subducting plate margins, and those along normal faults are even shorter.
The magnitude of an earthquake depends in part on the length of the geological fault on which the quake occurs. Longer faults result in stronger earthquakes. There are no known faults capable of ...
An active fault is a fault that is likely to become the source of another earthquake sometime in the future. Geologists commonly consider faults to be active if there has been movement observed or evidence of seismic activity during the last 10,000 years. [1] Active faulting is considered to be a geologic hazard – one related to earthquakes as
Earthquakes are common on the West Coast, with multiple plate boundaries like the San Andreas fault making geologic activity more likely. They are rarer on the East Coast, but they do happen .
As illustrated, an earthquake zone may start as a single crack, growing to form many individual cracks and collections of cracks along a fault. The key to fault growth is the concept of a "following force", as conveniently provided for interplate earthquakes, by the motion of tectonic plates. Under a following force, the seismic displacements ...
A fault off the Pacific coast could devastate Washington, Oregon and Northern California with a major earthquake and tsunami. Researchers mapped it comprehensively for the first time.