Interference pattern as a means of fault detection

One of the most important problems in the interpretation of seismic data is the detection and identification of faults and fault zones. The traditional approach is based on the identification of reflector discontinuities by visual inspection of stacked sections. Such an approach is most effective when constrained by the geologic knowledge of the interpreter; this, however, makes the procedure heavily dependent on the interpreter’s experience and a priori knowledge of relevant geologic information. The ambiguity is especially acute for small‐amplitude faults, since small discontinuities in the alignment of the reflection events may be smoothed over or even completely wiped out during the processing. On the other hand, such discontinuities on seismic sections are caused not only by faults but could also be caused by statics problems, velocity errors, etc.