Preseismic and coseismic magnetic field measurements near the Coyote Lake, California, earthquake of August 6, 1979

Authors:
  • MJM. J. S. Johnston
    M. J. S. Johnston
  • RMR. J. Mueller
    R. J. Mueller
  • VKV. Keller
    V. Keller
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Abstract
The epicenter of the Coyote Lake earthquake (ML = 5.9 ± 0.2) of August 6, 1979, is located within an array of recording magnetometers which has been in operation since 1974. The nearest instrument, COY, was within 5 km of the epicenter. It was installed in October 1978 and is located on sedimentary rock, although volcanic and ultramafic rocks with magnetizations of up to 1 A/m outcrop 2 km to the west. A second recording magnetometer was operated for 18 days, beginning 4 days after the main event, to record the latter stages of the aftershock activity. Although longer‐term magnetic field variations were recorded at station COY early in 1979 relative to other sites in the area, no anomalous changes within the two months prior to the earthquake were observed outside the present measurement uncertainty of 0.8 nT for hourly average differences. During the late aftershock stage, no magnetic field change greater than 0.25 nT occurred for more than a day. We conclude that in contrast to the 2‐nT change observed before a previous M = 5.2 earthquake near Hollister, California, no demonstrable preseismic, coseismic, or postseismic tectonomagnetic effect was detected. A reasonable seismomagnetic model of the earthquake indicates that station COY was poorly located to detect stress‐generated magnetic perturbations from this earthquake. Using a magnetization distribution indicated by modeling the aeromagnetic data over the area, we have calculated that homogeneous shear stress changes of about 5 MPa or greater would have been necessary to produce any observable effect at COY. This change in stress is precluded by geodetic data from over the area. However, COY is ideally situated for detection of electrokinetically generated magnetic anomalies. This initial null observation indicates that the assumptions used in the calculation of electrokinetic effects have, in this case, not been satisfied.

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