Recently, Zhou (2022) reported temporal change of seismic
velocity in the Earth’s outer core based on relative travel time
differences of SKS phase between some “doublets”. The study further
suggested existence of a possible 2-3% density deficit in the outer
core and a localized transient flow with a speed of ~40
km/year. We examine the seismic data of the best-quality “doublet”
(event pair 19970503-20180910) reported in the study. We relocate the
“doublet” based on a master-event relocation method (Wen , 2006)
using the seismic data of the compressional waves that travel outside
the outer core, including P or Pdiff , pP or pPdiff , pPn,
PP or Pdiff Pdiff , and PcP waves recorded at the global
seismographic network. The later event (20180910) is found to be located
14.20 km away, 204.33°NW, of the earlier event (19970503) with a source
depth 1.45 km deeper. After correction for the effects of relative
source location and origin time, SKS signals exhibit no discernable
relative travel time differences between the two events at the frequency
band ≥0.2 Hz at all the four most anomalous stations (COLA, INK, ULN,
YAK) reported in Zhou (2022). However, SPdKS-SKPdS phases, which
start bifurcating from the SKS phases at the distance range of those
four reported anomalous stations, exhibit evident changes of waveform
and travel time between the events. The “SKS signals” used inZhou (2022), which had a 50-s time window and were filtered from
0.01-0.05 Hz, contain signals of SKS and SPdKS-SKPdS phases. It is the
changes of SPdKS-SKPdS phases, not that of SKS phases, that generate the
apparent time shift in the low-frequency filtered “SKS signals”
reported in Zhou (2022). The SPdKS-SKPdS phases of those reported
anomalous stations sample a lowermost mantle region populated with
ultra-low velocity zones (ULVZs). The separation of the two events is
large and the SPdKS-SKPdS phases would sample ULVZs with slightly
different paths between the two events, yielding different waveform and
travel time (Wen & Helmberger , 1998). We conclude that there is
no observable temporal change of seismic properties in the Earth’s outer
core in the seismic data used in Zhou (2022) and the reported
relative travel time difference in the “SKS signals” in Zhou(2022) is caused by waveform and relative travel time changes in
SPdKS-SKPdS phases due to slightly different sampling paths to the ULVZs
at the bottom of the mantle between the events.