The East Anatolian Fault ( tr, Doğu Anadolu Fay Hattı) is a major strike-slip fault zone in eastern

Turkey Turkey ( tr, Türkiye ), officially the Republic of Türkiye ( tr, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti, links=no ), is a list of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country located mainly on the Anatolia, Anatolian Peninsula in Western Asia, with ...

. It forms the

transform Transform may refer to: Arts and entertainment * Transform (scratch), a type of scratch used by turntablists * ''Transform'' (Alva Noto album), 2001 * ''Transform'' (Howard Jones album) or the title song, 2019 * ''Transform'' (Powerman 5000 album ...

type tectonic boundary between the

Anatolian Plate The Anatolian Plate is a continental tectonic plate comprising most of the Anatolia (Asia Minor) peninsula (and the country of Turkey). To the east, the East Anatolian Fault, a left lateral transform fault, forms a boundary with the Arabian Pla ...

and the northward-moving

Arabian Plate The Arabian Plate is a minor tectonic plate in the Northern and Eastern Hemispheres. It is one of the three continental plates (along with the African and the Indian Plates) that have been moving northward in geological history and collidin ...

. The difference in the relative motions of the two plates is manifest in the left lateral motion along the fault. The East and North Anatolian faults together accommodate the westward motion of the Anatolian Plate as it is squeezed out by the ongoing collision with the

Eurasian Plate The Eurasian Plate is a tectonic plate that includes most of the continent of Eurasia (a landmass consisting of the traditional continents of Europe and Asia), with the notable exceptions of the Indian subcontinent, the Arabian subcontinent and ...

. The East Anatolian Fault runs in a northeasterly direction, starting from the

Maras Triple Junction Maras or Maraş (pronounced Marash) may refer to: Places * Maraş, Turkey, previous name until 1973 of Kahramanmaraş, a city in the Mediterranean Region, Turkey and the administrative center of Kahramanmaraş Province * Maras, Iran (disambiguati ...

at the northern end of the

Dead Sea Transform The Dead Sea Transform (DST) fault system, also sometimes referred to as the Dead Sea Rift, is a series of faults that run from the Maras Triple Junction (a junction with the East Anatolian Fault in southeastern Turkey) to the northern end of the ...

, and ending at the Karliova Triple Junction where it meets the

North Anatolian Fault The North Anatolian Fault (NAF) ( tr, Kuzey Anadolu Fay Hattı) is an active right-lateral strike-slip fault in northern Anatolia, and is the transform boundary between the Eurasian Plate and the Anatolian Plate. The fault extends westward fro ...

Seismicity

From 1939 to 1999 a series of earthquakes progressed westwards along the North Anatolian Fault. But since 1998 there have been a series on the East Anatolian Fault. These started with the 1998 Adana–Ceyhan earthquake and include the 2003 Bingöl earthquake, the 2010 Elâzığ earthquake and the

2020 Elazığ earthquake The 2020 Elazığ earthquake occurred at 20:55 local time (17:55 UTC) on 24 January in Turkey. The magnitude of the earthquake was determined to be 6.7 . The earthquake's epicentre was close to the town of Sivrice in Elazığ Province and fe ...

References

MAY 1, 2003 BİNGÖL (TURKEY) EARTHQUAKE Preliminary Report (Updated on May 13, 2003)
Seismic faults of Turkey Strike-slip faults {{Tectonics-stub