A recent study from the California Institute of Technology suggests that predictions about California’s San Andreas Fault may be overly simplistic. Following the devastating MW7.7 Mandalay earthquake in Myanmar in March 2025, which occurred along a previously inactive section of the 510-kilometer Sagar Fault, researchers noted that the earthquake’s scale exceeded expectations. Traditionally, scientists modeled seismic activity based on historical patterns, assuming that locked faults would eventually release accumulated stress in predictable ways. However, the Mandalay earthquake demonstrated that such models could be misleading, as it ruptured a longer segment than anticipated.
The findings indicate that future earthquakes on the San Andreas Fault might not resemble past events, emphasizing the need to consider the specific conditions of each fault segment. Caltech researchers argue that current models, which rely on historical data, fail to account for the uneven tension along fault lines. They advocate for physics-based models that incorporate real-time data to improve earthquake predictions, as historical records are often inadequate to capture the full range of possible seismic events. This study was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
