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Gravity changes before large earthquakes in China: 1998–2005

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Geo-spatial Information Science

Abstract

Although it is well known that coseismic gravity changes take place during an earthquake, previous research has not yielded convincing evidence demonstrating that significant gravity changes occur before large earthquakes. Furthermore, even if we suspect that gravity changes occur before large earthquakes, we have yet to demonstrate how to consistently observe these changes for useful earthquake forecast that would bring benefits to society. We analyzed ground gravity survey data obtained in 1998, 2000, 2002, and 2005 at stations of the Crustal Movement Observation Network of China (CMONOC) and examined gravity changes before the occurrence of nine large (M s ⩾6.8) earthquakes that ruptured within or near mainland China and Taiwan from November 2001 to August 2008. Results from this analysis show that significant gravity changes occurred across a large region before each of these nine large earthquakes, and these changes were detected by repeated ground gravity surveys through CMONOC. Although these gravity changes were significant, more research is needed to investigate whether these gravity changes could be viewed as precursors of large earthquakes. Limitations and uncertainties in the data include sparseness of the gravity monitoring network, long time intervals between consecutive gravity surveys, inevitable measurement errors, hydrological effects on gravity, and effects of vertical crustal movements on gravity. Based on these observations, we make several recommendations about possible future directions in earthquake-related research using gravity monitoring data.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Resource and Environmental Science, Wuhan University, 129 Luoyu Road, Wuhan, 430079, China

    F. Benjamin Zhan

  2. Texas Center for Geographic Information Science, Texas State University, San Marcos, TX, 78666, USA

    F. Benjamin Zhan

  3. Institute of Geodesy and Geophysics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 340 Xudong Street, Wuhan, 430077, China

    Yiqing Zhu & Jiangcun Zhou

  4. Second Crust Monitoring and Application Center, China Earthquake Administration, Xi’An, 710054, China

    Yiqing Zhu, Weifeng Liang & Yunma Xu

  5. School of Geodesy and Geomatics, Wuhan University, 129 Luoyu Road, Wuhan, 430079, China

    Jinsheng Ning

Authors
  1. F. Benjamin Zhan
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  2. Yiqing Zhu
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  3. Jinsheng Ning
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  4. Jiangcun Zhou
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  5. Weifeng Liang
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  6. Yunma Xu
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to F. Benjamin Zhan.

Additional information

Supported by the Chang Jiang Scholar Awards Program of China; the National Science Foundation of China (No. 40874035); the Special Earthquake Research Project from China Earthquake Administration (No. 200908029); the Knowledge Innovation Initiative of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (No. KZCX2-YW-133); the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 40730316).

ZHAN F. Benjamin is professor of Geographic Information Science and director of the Texas Center for Geographic Information Science in the Department of Geography at Texas State University-San Marcos. He also holds a Chang Jiang Scholar Guest Chair Professorship at Wuhan University in China. His major research interests are in Geographic Information Science as well as its applications, including (1) (visual) spatial analysis and modeling, (2) health and the environment, (3) hazards research and risk analysis, and (4) transportation and network science.

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Zhan, F.B., Zhu, Y., Ning, J. et al. Gravity changes before large earthquakes in China: 1998–2005. Geo-spat. Inf. Sci. 14, 1–9 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11806-011-0440-0

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11806-011-0440-0

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