Geodynamic Processes Preceding the Sea of Okhotsk Deep Earthquake of May 24, 2013, with Magnitude Mw = 8.3

Abstract

This study analyzes the set of parameters of geophysical fields and geodynamic events before the very strong Sea of Okhotsk earthquake of May 24, 2013, with M_w = 8.3 and a focal depth of 630 km. In the time neighborhood of the earthquake (May 19–20), temporally synchronous geodynamic processes were observed in the areas of Kamchatka Peninsula that were separated by hundreds of kilometers. The simultaneous occurrence of anomalies in the behavior of tilts and in the dynamics of subsoil radon flow, conditioned by the deformation of remote foreshock activation in Avacha Bay, argues for a united earthquake-preceding geodynamic process of a regional scale. A possible reason for the observed synphase geodynamic phenomena is a “geodeformation wave” that emerged at the last stage of preparation prior to the Sea of Okhotsk earthquake.