Imaging the Sources of the March 2021 Seismic Sequence in Thessaly Basin (Central Greece) from Kinematic Slip Inversion and Backprojection of Waveform Envelopes

Abstract

ABSTRACT In March 2021, a series of three moderate events with moment magnitudes Mw 6.3, 6.0, and 5.5 occurred within a span of 10 days in northern Thessaly, Greece, resulting in a stop–start pattern. The moment tensors (MTs) obtained from the events suggested normal faulting along distinct yet adjacent southeast–northwest-trending faults, indicating a sequential triggering process. We applied two methods to investigate the spatial and temporal characteristics of the source process of the triplet. This approach includes linear slip inversion of regional seismic waveforms and static Global Positioning System offsets, along with backprojection of regional waveforms using the Source-Scanning Algorithm technique. The detailed modeling suggests that three adjacent, subparallel (∼300°), and low-angle, detachment-type structures were responsible for the earthquakes. The stress axes orientation was determined by inverting a dataset of recomputed MTs combined with published solutions of the sequence. The results indicated a clockwise rotation of the local extensional axis by ∼25° compared to the regional ∼north–south extension. This rotation is consistent with the orientation of the modeled seismogenic structures. Inversions for both nodal planes and grid-searching fault geometry and orientation showed that for the first-two strongest events, the activated fault planes dipped to the northeast, whereas an antithetic (southwest dipping) fault was activated during the last weaker event. For the Mw 6.3 event, both the independent analyses indicated an overall rupture duration of ∼10 s, energy bursts above and near the hypocenter, up-dip (toward the southwest) rupture propagation in the early stages of the source process, and a bilateral rupture at later stages.