Consistency of postglacial geodynamics for the Kattegat region, southern Scandinavia, based on seismological, geological and geodetic data

Abstract

Th e earthquake map of Denmark is constantly being improved. Together with data from western Sweden and southern Norway it shows more and more convincingly a gradual, scattered earthquake activity across the Kattegat region from low activity in the Precambrian basement of Scandinavia to lack of earthquakes in south-western Denmark and northern Germany. Th e activity is only partly connected with mapped geological features. Th e three most recently felt earthquakes in Denmark augment and support this pattern with two or three activity concentrations in the seas around Denmark (Fig. 1). Th e smoothness and irregularities of this picture must in some way be related to the geological structure as well as to the geodynamic pattern of postglacial uplift mapped from geology and geodesy. Since the dominant stress fi eld, from the lithospheric plate motion is smooth (Gregersen & Voss 2010), a natural question is whether the picture