Prognostic anomalies of induced seismicity in the region of the Koyna-Warna water reservoirs, West India

In 2000, the region of the Koyna-Warna water reservoirs in West India was hit by two strong earthquakes, which occurred six months apart and had magnitudes M > 5. The Koyna-Warna seismic zone is a typical region of induced seismicity with a pronounced correlation between seismicity and water level variations in the reservoirs. This indicates that the stress level in the region is close to critical; thus, insignificant variations in stress caused by the variations in the water level may trigger a strong earthquake. In order to study the preparatory processes in the sources of the induced earthquakes, in this paper we analyze the seismic catalogue for the Koyna-Warna region before a pair of strong earthquakes of 2000. The induced seismicity is found to exhibit prognostic variations, which are typical of preparation of tectonic earthquakes and indicative of the formation of metastable source zones of future earthquakes. Based on the obtained results, we suggest that initiation of failure in these metastable zones within the region of induced seismicity could have been caused by the external impacts associated with water level variations in the reservoirs and by the internal processes of avalanche unstable crack propagation.