Structural analysis of recent and active faults and regional state of stress in the epicentral area of the 1978 Thessaloniki earthquakes (northern Greece)

During spring and summer 1978, Macedonia (Greece) suffered damaging seismic activity. During the two main shocks which occurred on May 23 (Mb = 5.7) and June 20 (Mb = 6.1), seismic open cracks and faults were formed in the epicentral area, 25 km NNE from Thessaloniki. They have been mapped and their kinematics analyzed. These studies have shown that they result from the reactivation of existing faults of Pleistocene, Recent, and historical age and that the crust is stretching along a N‐S to NNE‐SSW direction in that part of the North Aegean. Principal stress directions have been computed from the slip vectors measured on recent neotectonic faults and seismic cracks and faults, this computation utilizing a simple mechanical model (homogeneous deformation through the addition of small and independent displacements of rigid blocks in a highly fractured body). A striking feature of this analysis is that the tensional directions σ 3 deduced from seismic faulting and from recent neotectonic faulting are nearly the same. They are compatible with the regional tension axis deduced from focal mechanisms of North Aegean and with the focal mechanisms of the 1978 Thessaloniki main shocks. They are also compatible with in situ stress measurements in this region. Studies of superficial seismic faulting strongly support previous assumptions proposed from aftershock distribution: the 1978 Thessaloniki earthquakes resulted from reactivation of several different faults situated within the same NE dipping fault zone of Upper Eocene‐Lower Oligocene age (and older) separating the Serbo‐Macedonian Massif from the Peonias (East Vardar) zone.