DETERMINATION OF THE FAULT SLIP DISTRIBUTION OF THE 1976 TANGSHAN EARTHQUAKE BY THE FINITE ELEMENT METHOD

Abstract

A general method for the determination of the coseismic fault slip distribution by inversion of geodetic data is presented. One type of inverse problem and its solutions are investigated by the finite element and regularization methods. The coseismic fault slip vector is expressed by the solutions of the inverse problem of partial differential equations. The proposed method is used to determine the coseismic fault slip distribution on the Tangshan fault and Young's modulus of the rock in the area around the coseismic fault, and the results show that the inverted fault slip distribution is in good agreement with the observed surface offsets on the fault caused by the earthquake.