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Limit of strain partitioning in the Himalaya marked by large earthquakes in western Nepal

Abstract

Great earthquakes and high seismic risk in the Himalaya are thought to be focussed near the range front, where the Indian Plate slides beneath the mountain range1,2. However, the Himalaya is curved and plate convergence becomes increasingly oblique westwards. Strain in the western Himalaya is hypothesized to be partitioned, such that western parts move northwestwards3 with respect to the central Himalaya. Here we use field data to identify a 63-km-long earthquake rupture on a previously unrecognized fault in the western Himalaya, far from the range front. We use radiocarbon dating to show that one or more earthquakes created 10 m of surface displacement on the fault between AD 1165 and 1400. During this time interval, large range-front earthquakes also occurred1,4,5. We suggest that the active fault we identified is part of a larger fault system, the Western Nepal Fault System, which cuts obliquely across the Himalaya. We combine our observations with a geodynamical model to show that the Western Nepal Fault System marks the termination of the strain-partitioned region of the western Himalaya and comprises a first-order structure in the three-dimensional displacement field of the mountain range. Our findings also identify a potential seismic hazard within the interior of the Himalaya that may necessitate significant changes to seismic hazard assessments.

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Figure 1: Map of the Western Nepal Fault System (WNFS)
Figure 2: Map of the WNFS fault scarp.
Figure 3: Jangla oblique segment fault scarps.
Figure 4: Three-dimensional mechanical numerical experiment of a segmented oblique-convergent orogen with predefined weak zones at the base and rear of the orogenic wedge.

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Acknowledgements

The authors thank A. Telka (PaleoTec Services) and J. Southon (Keck-Carbon Cycle AMS facility—University of California, Irvine) for their work in preparing and analysing the radiocarbon samples. We thank B. Chand from Earth’s Paradise Geo Trekking for logistical support in the field. Field costs for M.A.M. were provided by the UH GEAR programme. Field costs for M.H.T. were provided by the KU General Research Fund. NSERC Discovery Grant to J.G. paid for the sample preparation, AMS analyses and some of the travel costs.

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M.A.M., M.H.T., J.G. and C.R.P.S. carried out the fieldwork. J.G. described the stratigraphy and directed the dating effort. M.A.M. and M.H.T. equally directed the mapping effort. D.M.W. and C.B. carried out the mechanical modelling and drafted Fig. 4 and Supplementary Fig. 6. All authors contributed to writing the manuscript.

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Correspondence to M. A. Murphy.

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The authors declare no competing financial interests.

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Murphy, M., Taylor, M., Gosse, J. et al. Limit of strain partitioning in the Himalaya marked by large earthquakes in western Nepal. Nature Geosci 7, 38–42 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1038/ngeo2017

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