Evidence for a difference in rupture initiation between small and large earthquakes

The process of earthquake rupture nucleation and propagation has been investigated through laboratory experiments and theoretical modelling, but a limited number of observations exist at the scale of earthquake fault zones. Distinct models have been proposed, and whether the magnitude can be predicted while the rupture is ongoing represents an unsolved question. Here we show that the evolution of P-wave peak displacement with time is informative regarding the early stage of the rupture process and can be used as a proxy for the final size of the rupture. For the analysed earthquake set, we found a rapid initial increase of the peak displacement for small events and a slower growth for large earthquakes. Our results indicate that earthquakes occurring in a region with a large critical slip distance have a greater likelihood of growing into a large rupture than those originating in a region with a smaller slip-weakening distance.