Abstract: The article analyzed the weekly time series data of horizontal displacement at fiducial stations of China's continent by using the empirical orthogonal function (EOF) in Meteorology. Firstly, making the time series continuous through inserting data, and secondly removing the secular displacement rate from the time series data through linear fitness. The authors studied the temporal and spatial distribution of the horizontal displacement fields in EW component and NS component before strong earthquakes by analyzing strong earthquake examples.

Key words: Horizontal displacement field, EOF analysis, Temporal and spatial distribution, Time series