Overview of the virtual special issue on the 2023 Kahramanmaraş,Türkiye earthquake doublet

On 6 February 2023,a calamitous earthquake with a magnitude of 7.8 struck close to the city of Kahraman-maraş,sending tremors through southeastern Türkiye and northern Syria.This earthquake(Event 1),which initiated at 04:17:34 AM local time(or 01:17:34 UTC according to the United States Geological Survey,USGS),persisted for approximately 90 seconds,carving a trail of destruction along roughly 380 kilometers of the Earth’s surface(e.g.,Ren CM et al.,2024).This initial earthquake was succeeded by a second significant tremor,Event 2,with a magnitude of 7.6,occurring nine hours later at 10:24:48 UTC(according to the USGS).Event 2 propagated along a different fault line,approximately 100 kilometers north of the epicenter of Event 1,generating surface ruptures extending close to 200 kilometers.The twin seismic shocks of the 2023 Kahramanmaraşearthquake wrought extensive havoc,devastating densely inhabited regions spanning several large cities in southeastern Türkiye and northwestern Syria,including but not limited to Kahramanmaraş,Adıyaman,Şanlıurfa,Antakya,Gaziantep,Malatya,İskenderun,and Adana.The tragic aftermath of these events includes a death toll of some 60,000 and over 120,000 injuries across the two nations.