Implications of earthquake focal mechanism data for the active tectonics of the south Caspian Basin and surrounding regions

SUMMARY The south Caspian Basin is a relatively aseismic block within the Alpine-Himalayan Belt, but is surrounded by zones of high seismicity. We used the focal mechanisms of 16 earthquakes whose source parameters we determined from inversion of body waves and the mechanisms of 15 other earthquakes to determine the style of faulting in the seismic belts surrounding the south Caspian Basin. Earthquakes beneath the Talesh Mountains of north-west Iran and immediately off-shore in the south-west Caspian Sea have shallow thrust mechanisms, showing that the continental crust of north-west Iran is overthrusting the ‘oceanic-like’ crust of the south Caspian Basin. Earthquakes south of the Caspian Sea in northern Iran show a mixture of focal mechanisms. Both high-angle reverse faulting and left-lateral strike-slip faulting mechanisms are observed in the high Alborz Mountains. Farther south, on the edge of the central Iran plateau, oblique left-lateral reverse mechanisms are observed. It appears that the NE direction of shortening between central Iran and the south Caspian Basin is partitioned into pure left-lateral strike-slip and thrusting in the WNW-trending high Alborz, but is accommodated by oblique faulting in lower elevations. Earthquakes in the Kopet Dag Mountains east of the Caspian Sea also show a mixture of high-angle reverse and strike-slip faulting mechanisms and may be another example of the partitioning of oblique slip into strike slip and thrust motion. Normal faulting mechanisms at centroid depths of 35–50 km dominate in the belt of seismicity that extends across the central Caspian Sea. The significance of the normal faulting earthquakes is enigmatic. It is improbable that these events represent the motion between the southern Caspian Basin and Eurasia for they imply a sense of motion that is incompatible with the observed topography and folding in the sediments. Two shallow earthquakes at about 12 km depth in this belt, one a small event and the other a large second subevent of a multiple earthquake, have thrusting mechanisms suggesting that shortening occurs as the continental crust of the northern Caspian Sea is thrust over the ‘oceanic-like’ crust of the southern Caspian Basin. Shortening is also suggested by the orientations of folds in the sedimentary cover south of the central Caspian Sea seismic belt. We suggest that this shortening does indeed represent a NNE motion of the Caspian Sea relative to Eurasia, but that the motion is slow and has not produced many earthquakes. The deeper, normal-faulting events may be related to bending or down-dip extension of the incipient subducted slab. If the motion of the Caspian Sea relative to Eurasia is indeed slow, then the motion in the Alborz between central Iran and the south Caspian Basin will be almost the same as that between Iran and Eurasia, as has previously been assumed. The combined effect of the overthrusting of the south Caspian Basin by the Talesh-Alborz Mountains in the south, and by the continental crust of the northern Caspian Sea in the north will lead to the eventual destruction of the south Caspian Basin and the possible formation of an intermediate-depth, dipping seismic zone within the continental interior, similar to that presently observed in the Hindu Kush.