Coulomb stress change sensitivity due to variability in mainshock source models and receiving fault parameters: A case study of the 2010-2011 Christchurch, New Zealand, earthquakes

Strong aftershocks following major earthquakes present significant challenges for infrastructure recovery as well as for emergency rescue efforts. A tragic instance of this is the 22 February 2011 M_w 6.3 Christchurch aftershock in New Zealand, which caused more than 100 deaths while the 2010 M_w 7.1 Canterbury mainshock did not cause a single fatality (Figure 1). Therefore, substantial efforts have been directed toward understanding the generation mechanisms of aftershocks as well as mitigating hazards due to aftershocks. Among these efforts are the prediction of strong aftershocks, earthquake early warning, and aftershock probability assessment. Zhang et al. (1999) reported a successful case of strong aftershock prediction with precursory data such as changes in seismicity pattern, variation of b-value, and geomagnetic anomalies. However, official reports of such successful predictions in geophysical journals are extremely rare, implying that deterministic prediction of potentially damaging aftershocks is not necessarily more scientifically feasible than prediction of mainshocks.