Mechanism of Propagation of Deformations and Stresses in the Earth’s Crust

Transient creep, which occurs at small deformations, leads to a small thickness of the upper elastic crust and low viscosity of the underlying layer. The solution to the propagation problem of deformations and stresses in the upper layers of the Earth is obtained by using a thin elastic plate as a model of the upper elastic crust and a viscous half-space as a model of the underlying layer. It is shown that stress waves decay very quickly and cannot propagate over large distances.