Past exam of the year 2 of the earth sciences (geology) course of the University of Oxford / 2022 / Paper 1 / 3 / d / ii / Solution

After removing orbital, topographic and atmospheric contributions, an earthquake InSAR radar interferogram would show elongated displacement lobes and generally closed or nested fringes associated with uplift and horizontal shortening of the hanging wall. Each full phase cycle represents ${\lambda }_r/2$ of line-of-sight displacement, where ${\lambda }_r$ is radar wavelength; equivalently $\Delta \varphi =\pm 4\pi d_{\mathrm{LOS}}/{\lambda }_r$, with sign fixed by processing convention.^[ref]

If primary slip reaches the surface, expect a displacement discontinuity across the surface trace: fringes can terminate or change abruptly there, and large near-fault gradients or disturbed ground may decorrelate. For a blind reverse fault, the elastic displacement field is continuous at the ground surface and spread over a broader zone, giving smoother gradients and fringes over the uplifted fold. A blind rupture can still create sharp local gradients or secondary faulting.

The exact colour order, number of fringes and sign of the displacement lobes cannot be fixed from this shaded relief alone. They depend on slip, depth and radar look direction; uplift is only one contribution to line-of-sight displacement.