Modeling the poroelastic response to megathrust earthquakes: A look at the 2012 Mw 7.6 Costa Rican event

We model the subsurface hydrologic response to the 7.6 Mw subduction zone earthquake that occurred on the plate interface beneath the Nicoya peninsula in Costa Rica on September 5, 2012. The regional-scale poroelastic model of the overlying plate integrates seismologic, geodetic and hydrologic data sets to predict the post-seismic poroelastic response. A representative two-dimensional model shows that thrust earthquakes with a slip width less than a third of their depth produce complex multi-lobed pressure perturbations in the shallow subsurface. This leads to multiple poroelastic relaxation timescales that may overlap with the longer viscoelastic timescales. In the three-dimensional model, the complex slip distribution of 2012 Nicoya event and its small width to depth ratio lead to a pore pressure distribution comprising multiple trench parallel ridges of high and low pressure. This leads to complex groundwater flow patterns, non-monotonic variations in predicted well water levels, and poroelastic relaxation on multiple time scales. The model also predicts significant tectonically driven submarine groundwater discharge off-shore. In the weeks following the earthquake, the predicted net submarine groundwater discharge in the study area increases, creating a 100 fold increase in net discharge relative to topography-driven flow over the first 30 days. Our model suggests the hydrological response on land is more complex than typically acknowledged in tectonic studies. This may complicate the interpretation of transient post-seismic surface deformations. Combined tectonic-hydrological observation networks have the potential to reduce such ambiguities.