Satellite observation based thermal anomalies detection for 2016 Menyuan MS6.4 earthquake

摘要

Thermal anomalies might be an important precursor of earthquake, however not fully proved. In this study, time series of Land Surface Temperature (LST) data spanning over 14 years have been processed and analyzed to locate possible anomalous variations prior to the 2016 Menyuan Ms6.4 earthquake (China). A smoothing procedure have been applied to exclude the seasonal or annual effects from the LST variations, also to avoid the rainy and cloudy weather for the study area, using ten-day mean LST data derived from daily MODIS LST products from 2001 to 2014. Then the ten-day mean LST data from December 2015 to February 2016 were differenced using the above background. Anomaly detection algorithm was then used to detect the LST anomalies. It is found that anomalies exist around the Lenglongling and Menyuan fault belt, indicating that LST change detection is effective in this area for earthquake precursor study.