Intraplate earthquakes in North China - Intraplate Earthquakes - page 119

over long distances and multiple timescales (e.g., Luo and Liu, 2012 ) , rather than focusing
on stress evolution on an isolated fault or fault segment. Paleoseismic studies should not be
limited to where large earthquakes occurred recently, and detailed and careful analysis are
needed to determine the age and spatial scale of past events, without trying to fit expected
recurrence intervals (Xu and Deng, 1996 ) . As for North China, the potential for repeated
large earthquakes in Tangshan and Xingtai is likely lower than that generally perceived,
if the 2,000-year historic record can provide any hints. In contrast, the Shanxi rift zone,
which has produced more than 36 M 6.5 earthquakes since 1303 but has been quiescent

for the past 300 years, may deserve closer monitoring, and the Weihe rift zone, the host for
the 1556 Huaxian earthquake (M 8.0) and with relatively high contemporary strain rates
( Figure 5.5a ) , may not be as safe as suggested by the hazard map.

Acknowledgements

Seth Stein inspired our interest in intraplate earthquakes and co-authored a number of
papers reviewed here. We thank Roy Van Arsdale and Pradeep Talwani for their constructive
reviews. ML's research in China is supported by NSF/OISE grant 0730154 and a grant from
the Chinese Academy of Sciences. HW acknowledges support from the National Natural
Science Foundation of China (Grants 41104058 and 41104057).

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