Fig. 1

Schematic model of the environment where repeating earthquakes occur in a subduction zone. The repeating earthquakes occur on a seismic patch (black spots) in the creeping area of the plate boundary. They produce similar waveforms when observed by the same station (left top) because the seismic patch is loaded by creep in the surrounding area and repeat rupture at the same place. The creeping area (slip shown in red in the right top panel) and repeating earthquake patch (slip shown in red in the right bottom panel) undergo almost the same long-term cumulative slip because they are located on neighboring plate boundaries. The dashed line shows slip at neighboring area (seismic patch for creeping area and vice versa). Please note the patch for the repeating earthquake may have slip in the interseismic period (Beeler et al. 2001) but the relationship between the slip at the creeping area and the slip at patch for repeating earthquakes holds in that case too