[SSS12-02] Monitoring Stress-Induced Seismic Velocity Changes At SAFOD Using Crosswell Continuous Active-Source Seismic Monitoring (CASSM)
Keywords:Stress-induced velocity change, Active source, Borehole seismic monitoring
Monitoring of in-situ, stress-induced, seismic velocity change provides an increasingly important contribution to the study of the earthquake nucleation process. Continuous Active-Source Seismic Monitoring (CASSM) with borehole sources and sensors has proven to be a very effective tool to monitor seismic velocity and to identify its temporal variations at depth. Since June 2017, we have been operating a crosswell CASSM field experiment at the San Andreas Fault Observatory at Depth (SAFOD) where a previous CASSM experiment identified the two seismic velocity reductions approximately 10 and 2 hours before micro-earthquakes.
The ultimate goal of our experiment is to continuously monitor tectonic stress for the San Andreas Fault near seismogenic depth. Our active-source experiment makes use of two boreholes drilled at the SAFOD project site. A piezoelectric source and a three-component accelerometer have been installed in the SAFOD pilot and main holes, respectively, at about 1 km depth. A seismic pulse is generated by the piezoelectric source four times per second, and waveforms are recorded with a 48 kHz sample rate, with recordings summed for 1 to 10 minutes to capture seismic velocity changes at a high-temporal resolution.
Since deployment in June 2017, and as of July, 2019, local seismicity has not been above our current threshold of detection. However, we have identified a velocity reduction at the SAFOD site (0.5 microsecond change in crosswell travel time, measured in a coda window) possibly induced by dynamic stress changes from the distant 6 July 2019 M 7.1 Ridgecrest earthquake, California. We will characterize and report the co-seismic change and post-seismic recovery process for this remotely triggered velocity change. We will also report on the overall status of this unique CASSM experiment.
The ultimate goal of our experiment is to continuously monitor tectonic stress for the San Andreas Fault near seismogenic depth. Our active-source experiment makes use of two boreholes drilled at the SAFOD project site. A piezoelectric source and a three-component accelerometer have been installed in the SAFOD pilot and main holes, respectively, at about 1 km depth. A seismic pulse is generated by the piezoelectric source four times per second, and waveforms are recorded with a 48 kHz sample rate, with recordings summed for 1 to 10 minutes to capture seismic velocity changes at a high-temporal resolution.
Since deployment in June 2017, and as of July, 2019, local seismicity has not been above our current threshold of detection. However, we have identified a velocity reduction at the SAFOD site (0.5 microsecond change in crosswell travel time, measured in a coda window) possibly induced by dynamic stress changes from the distant 6 July 2019 M 7.1 Ridgecrest earthquake, California. We will characterize and report the co-seismic change and post-seismic recovery process for this remotely triggered velocity change. We will also report on the overall status of this unique CASSM experiment.