Theory of Volumetric Moving Dislocation in Poroelastic Halfspace and Characterization of Magma Intrusion Events

The undrained change in pore fluid pressure that accompanies dike intrusion may be conveniently represented as a moving volumetric dislocation. The concept of a dilation center was developed to represent the field of undrained pressure change in a saturated linear elastic medium. Since instantaneous pore fluid pressures can be developed to a considerable distance from the dislocation, monitoring the rate of pressure generation and subsequent pressure dissipation in a fully coupled manner enables certain characteristics of the resulting dislocation to be defined. The principal focus of this study is the application of dislocation-based methods to analyze the behavior of the fluid pressure response induced by intrusive dislocations in a semi-infinite space, such as dike intrusion, hydraulic fracturing and piezometer insertion. Partially drained pore pressures result from the isothermal introduction of volumetric moving pencil-like dislocations described as analogs to moving point dislocation within a semi-infinite saturated elastic medium. To represent behavior within the halfspace, an image dislocation is positioned under the moving coordinate frame fixed to the front of the primary moving dislocation, to yield an approximate solution for pore pressure for constant fluid pressure conditions. Induced pore pressures are concisely described under a minimum set of dimensionless parameter groupings representing propagation velocity, and relative geometry. Charts defining induced pore fluid pressure at a static measuring point provide a meaningful tool for determining unknown parameters in data reduction. Two intrusive events at Krafla, Iceland are examined using the type curve matching techniques. Predicted parameters agree favorably with field data.