assessment of earthquake activity of a rift-bounding fault, northwest of gulf of suez, egypt

Mohammad, Shadi Abdelhadi; ِِAbdelmalik, Karim; Elhady, Sherif Mohammad; Abd-Allah, Ali Mohammad

doi:10.21608/egjg.2025.390447.1116

assessment of earthquake activity of a rift-bounding fault, northwest of gulf of suez, egypt

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

¹ Demonstrator at the Geology department, Faculty of Science, Ain Shams University

² Ain Shams University, Faculty of Science, Geology Department, 11566, Cairo, Egypt

³ Seismology Department, National Research Institute of astronomy and geophysics

10.21608/egjg.2025.390447.1116

Abstract

Ongoing tectonic activity—originally responsible for the development of a rift-bounding fault system in the northwestern Gulf of Suez, Egypt—has prompted a preliminary assessment of related seismic events. The study focuses on several urbanized sites along the western coastline, where recent surface fractures were documented and analysed to explore their connection to ongoing seismicity. It is an initial attempt to apply TENSOR stress inversion techniques—such as PBT and right-dihedral methods—were applied to field-measured fracture data that were systematically collected from six key sites. The analysis generated reduced stress tensors, rose diagrams, Mohr circles, and stereographic projections, revealing localized stress regimes across the region, from which the mean stress regime acting upon the entire region was retrieved. While most sites displayed pure or axial extensional stress fields, transtensional regimes were identified in specific cases. The spatial correlation between recent fracture orientations and the traces of pre-existing deep-seated faults revealed dominant E–W to NNW–SSE trends, consistent with the stress fields associated with Miocene Gulf of Suez rifting. However, notable ENE–WSW fracture patterns observed at Banzeenah and Porto sites suggest the presence of additional localized tectonic influences. Overall, those integrated approaches highlight the continued reactivation of pre-existing rift-related structures and their role in present-day seismic deformation along the western margin of the Gulf of Suez.

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