A sequence of three strong (MW 7.2–6.4) and several moderate (MW 4.4–5.7) earthquakes struck the Pamir Plateau and surrounding mountain ranges of Tajikistan, China, and Kyrgyzstan in 2015–2017. With a local seismic network in operation in the Xinjiang province of China since August 2015 (FDSN code 8H; Yuan et al., 2018a), an aftershock network on the Pamir Plateau of Tajikistan since February 2016 (FDSN code 9H; Yuan et al., 2018b), and additional permanent regional seismic stations (FDSN code TJ; PMP International, 2005; XJ network; SEISDMC, 2021), we were able to record the succession of the fore-, main-, and aftershock sequences at local distances with good azimuthal coverage. We here provide P and S body wave arrival times of the 11,784 relocated seismic events and additional arrival times of 18,011 seismic events that could not be located with precision.
The ASCII QuakeML files (.xml; https://quake.ethz.ch/quakeml/QuakeML) consist of seismic arrival times, station and network codes, nominal arrival time uncertainties, localization residuals, and corresponding preliminary event locations.
The ASCII NonLinLoc Hypocenter-Phase files (.hyp; http://alomax.free.fr/nlloc/ -> Formats -> NLLoc Hypocenter-Phase file) consist of seismic arrival times, station codes, nominal arrival time uncertainties, localization residuals, ray take-off angles and corresponding preliminary event locations.
A sequence of three strong (M W 7.2–6.4) and several moderate (M W 4.4–5.7) earthquakes struck the Pamir Plateau and surrounding mountain ranges of Tajikistan, China, and Kyrgyzstan in 2015–2017. With a local seismic network in operation in the Xinjiang province since August 2015, an aftershock network on the Pamir Plateau of Tajikistan since February 2016, and additional permanent regional seismic stations, we were able to record the succession of the fore-, main-, and aftershock sequences at local distances with good azimuthal coverage. We located 11,784 seismic events and determined the moment tensor for 33 earthquakes. The seismicity delineates the major tectonic structures of the Pamir, i.e., the thrusts that absorb shortening along the plateau thrust front, and the strike-slip and normal faults that dissect the Plateau into a westward extruding and a northward advancing block. Fault ruptures were activated subsequently at increasing distances from the initial M W 7.2 Sarez. All mainshock areas but the initial one exhibited foreshock seismicity which was not modulated by the occurrence of the earlier earthquakes.
The tabular ASCII data of the seismic event catalog consist of origin date, time, location, depth and magnitude of the events, along with the quality measures: number of P- and S-wave arrival time picks, location root-mean-square misfit and localization method.
The tabular ASCII data of the moment tensor catalog consist of origin date, time, location, the six
independent components of the moment tensor, the moment magnitude, and the orientation of the preferred fault plane parameterized as fault strike, dip and rake.
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Version history:
2026-01-31: Version 2.0
Exchange of the file "2022-007_Bloch-et-al_moment_tensor_catalog.txt" with the new file "2022-007_Bloch-et-al_moment_tensor_catalog_correct_norm_v2.0.txt". The original file is available in the "previous-versions" folder.
Reason: The normalization of the components of the moment tensor (columns mrr, mtt, mff, mrt, mrf, mtf, exp) was incorrect so that the resulting moment tensor had a too large absolute moment. The reported moment magnitude and the relative scaling of the moment tensor components was correct, thought.