Evidence of Systematic Triggering at Teleseismic Distances Following Large Earthquakes

Earthquakes are part of a cycle of tectonic stress buildup and release. As fault zones near the end of this seismic cycle, tipping points may be reached whereby triggering occurs and small forces result in cascading failures. The extent of this effect on global seismicity is currently unknown. Here we present evidence of ongoing triggering of earthquakes at remote distances following large source events. The earthquakes used in this study had magnitudes >= M5.0 and the time period analyzed following large events spans three days. Earthquake occurrences display increases over baseline rates as a function of arc distance away from the epicenters. The p-values deviate from a uniform distribution, with values for collective features commonly below 0.01. An average global forcing function of increased short term seismic risk is obtained along with an upper bound response. The highest magnitude source events trigger more events, and the average global response indicates initial increased earthquake counts followed by quiescence and recovery. Higher magnitude earthquakes also appear to be triggered more often than lower magnitude events. The region with the greatest chance of induced earthquakes following all source events is on the opposite side of the earth, within 30 degrees of the antipode.