ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Earth Sci.
Sec. Geohazards and Georisks
Using the Distribution Characteristics of Landslides to Revise the Parameters of the 1626 Lingqiu Earthquakeauht-info
Provisionally accepted
- Shanxi Earthquake Agency, Taiyuan, China
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According to historical records, a strong earthquake with magnitude 7 occurred in Lingqiu, Shanxi, in 1626 with an epicenter at 39.4°N, 114.2°E. The epicenter location and magnitude have been primarily determined through historical earthquake disaster records. However, owing to the loss and omissions of historical earthquake disaster records, certain deviations in the epicenter location and magnitude may exist. From field observations, landslides were found to be highly developed near the epicenter of this earthquake. Therefore, this study collected historical materials on the related damage and determined the effective range of earthquake-induced landslides. Inter-pretation of landslide bodies near the epicenter was performed using high-resolution remote-sensing images, they were confirmed on site, and a landslide database was established.. The macroscopic epicenter was determined to be at 39°25′42″N and 114°12′10″E, located 0.30 km east and 3.0 km north of the original epicenter. The landslides from the Lingqiu earthquake were roughly distributed in two directions, northeast and northwest of the epicenter. The actual distribution of the landslide mass had a length of 75 km on the outer envelope, and the magnitude of the Lingqiu earthquake has been revised to magnitude 7.1. This method can be applied to correct historical strong earthquake event parameters worldwide.
Keywords: epicenter correction, landslide, Lingqiu earthquake, magnitude correction, Strong earthquake
Received: 12 Jan 2026; Accepted: 09 Feb 2026.
Copyright: © 2026 Yan, Li, Sun and You. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Zihong Li
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