A strong Mw7.0 earthquake struck Pingtung offshore of Talwan on December 26, 2006. It consisted of two major events with an 8-minute interval. The first major shock occurred at 12：26 UTC. Focal mechanism results from Harvard, USGS, and BATS all indicated that the first major shock was a normal fault earthquake and the second one was dominated by strike-slip offsets. The location of the epicenter varied greatly in depth in different analyses. The latest results showed that the focal depth of the first shock was most probably around 40-44 km, placing the epicenter in the lithospheric mantle. However, this is not a location where earthquakes usually occur. To explore the geodynamical mechanism of this event, we carded out 2D finite element method （FEM） numerical experiments. Our primary results indicate that the geodynamical background, as well as the formation of Pingtung earthquake, is a consequence of the collision between Luzon arc and Chinese continental margin. Although Taiwan Island is in the shadow of NW-SE trending compressive collision zone, the existence of ductile lower crust leads to the decoupling between upper crust and lithospheric mantle. As lithospheric mantle subducts to the depth of around 250 km, the upper part of the bending subduction slab puts itself in an extensional state. The extensional stress from bending induced the occurrence of this normal fault earthquake at the critical point.
From Global Position System(GPS) measurements,there is a clockwise rotation around the eastern Himalayan syntax in the Tibetan Plateau.This phenomenon is difficult to be interpreted by simple two-dimensional modeling from a geodynamic point of view.Because of the extremely thick crust and the lower crust with relatively high temperature in the Tibetan Plateau,the lithospheric rheology in Tibet and surrounding areas present a complex structure.In general,the tectonic structure of the Tibetan Plateau consists of brittle upper crust,ductile lower crust,high viscosity lithospheric upper mantle,and low viscosity asthenosphere,the same as the case in many other continental regions.However,the lower crust in the Tibetan Plateau is much more ductile with a lower viscosity than those of its sur-roundings at the same depth,and the effective viscosity is low along the collision fault zone.In this study,we construct a three-dimensional Maxwell visco-elastic model in spherical coordinate system,and simulate the deformation process of the Tibetan Plateau driven by a continuous push from the Indian plate.The results show that the existence of the soft lower crust under the plateau makes the entire plateau uplift as a whole,and the Himalayas and the eastern Himalayan syntax uplift faster.Since the lower crust of surrounding blocks is harder except in the southeastern corner where the high-temperature material is much softer and forms an exit channel for material transfer,after the whole plateau reaches a certain height,the lower crustal and upper mantle material begins to move eastward or southeastward and drag the upper crust to behave same way.Thus,from the macroscopic point of view,a relative rigid motion of the plateau with a clockwise rotation around the eastern Himalayan syntax is developed.
We used 71670 P-wave arrival times from 3594 earthquakes recorded by the Sichuan and Yunnan seismic networks to determine the three-dimensional P-wave velocity structure in the crust and uppermost mantle beneath the southeastern Tibetan Plateau. Our results show that prominent low P-wave velocity (low-Vp) anomalies exist in the midto lower crust of the Song- pan-Ganze and Sichuan-Yunnan blocks. In contrast, a high P-wave velocity (high-Vp) anomaly is resolved in the middle and lower crust beneath the Sichuan Basin. Our tomographic results provide seismic evidence for a dynamic model of lower crustal flow. Ongoing lower crustal flow beneath the central and eastern Tibetan Plateau abuts against the mechanically strong Si- chuan Basin resulting in accumulated strain in the Longmen Shan region. When a critical accumulation of strain energy was reached, its sudden release led to the occurrence of 2008 Wenchuan earthquake. Pronounced low-Vp anomalies are observed in the uppermost mantle in the region south of ~26°N. Combining these results with shear-wave splitting investigations, we suggest that the flow of asthenospheric material has impacted the velocity structure of the uppermost mantle and caused the thinning of the southwestern Yangtze Craton.
