Scaling Analysis of Time Distribution between Successive Earthquakes in Aftershock Sequences

Abstract

The earthquake inter-event time distribution is studied, using catalogs for different recent aftershock sequences. For aftershock sequences following the Modified Omori’s Formula (MOF) it seems clear that the inter-event distribution is a power law. The parameters of this law are defined and they prove to be higher than the calculated value (2–1/p). Based on the analysis of the catalogs, it is determined that the probability densities of the inter-event time distribution collapse into a single master curve when the data is rescaled with instantaneous intensity, R(t; Mth), defined by MOF. The curve is approximated by a gamma distribution. The collapse of the data provides a clear view of aftershock-occurrence self-similarity.