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The Thickness of Deep Seismic Zones

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Abstract

SEISMIC ray tracing1–4 has shown that the slabs of lithosphere which descend into the mantle in subduction zones are approximately 80 km thick. Within these slabs there are thin zones in which earthquakes occur5. Here I estimate the thickness of the seismic zone in Tonga as ∼11 km, from the source dimensions of the large intermediate earthquakes.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, University of Colorado, Boulder, Colorado, 80302

    MAX WYSS

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  1. MAX WYSS
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WYSS, M. The Thickness of Deep Seismic Zones. Nature 242, 255–256 (1973). https://doi.org/10.1038/242255a0

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/242255a0

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