EarthScope: San Andreas Fault Observatory at Depth (SAFOD)  
     

General Info

Data

Pilot Hole

Site Characterization (goes to usgs site)

Science Team

Institutional Collaborators

  

Goal: The San Andreas Fault Observatory at Depth (SAFOD) will provide direct observational data on the composition, physical state and mechanical behavior of a major active fault zone at depth to test hypotheses pertaining to faulting and earthquake generation with the ultimate goal leading to earthquake hazards reduction. more...

SAFOD is part of EarthScope an NSF project to study the struture and dynamics of the North American Continent

SAFOD News:

Phase2 Drilling starts June 13, 2005
Phase 1 Drilling starts June 1, 2004
Quicktime VR Panoramas of the drill site

 
    The drill site is located on a segment of the San Andreas Fault that moves through a combination of aseismic creep and repeating microearthquakes (Figure 1). It lies at the extreme northern end of the rupture zone of the 1966, Magnitude 6 Parkfield earthquake, the most recent in a series of events that have ruptured the fault five times since 1857. The Parkfield region is the most comprehensively instrumented section of a fault anywhere in the world, and has been the focus of intensive study for the past two decades.