Gravity slide origin of rift zones of some Hawaiian volcanoes

Abstract

The east-trending east rift zone of Kilauea volcano on the island of Hawaii is 50 km long and up to 3 km wide. It consists of three elements arranged roughly in three belts from north to south: 1) eruptive fissures, cracks, faults, and narrow grabens, 2) cinder cones (produced by eruptions more localised than the fissure eruptions), and 3) pit craters. Eruptive vents, either fissure or cone, do not occur south of pit craters; vents occur on the floor of some pit craters but are conlined to the north half. Most earthquakes near the rift zone are shallow; they are abundant south of the rift zone but rare north of it. Precise levelling over a 6-year period shows elevation changes of up to 1 metre. Profiles of elevation change across the rift zone are asymmetrically steep on the north side. Precise triangulation shows that points south of the rift have been moving southward at right angles to the rift zone at rates of as much as 10 cm per year. During the major earthquake of 1868, the south coast of the island subsided as much as 2 metres, and abundant evidence indicates other recent subsidence of the south coast. The above facts suggest that the rift zone dips south and that it bounds a large segment of the volcano which is sliding down the steep southern flank. Tensional cracks at the head of this slide tap the shallow central reservoir of the volcano at a depth of a few kilometres. The resulting dikes may feed eruptive fissures in the tensional zone at the head (northernmost part) of the slide, or they may pierce the hanging wall of the south-dipping rift zone through more confined conduits and feed the cinder cones. Likewise, shallow collapse into the rift zone on the north produces narrow grabens, whereas deeper collapse farther south (perhaps aided by magma stoping upward) produces circular pit craters. Submarine topography south of Kilauea caldera indicates a submarine landslide on the south slope of the volcano. The landslide tongue is more than 25 kilometres long and is bounded upslope by a concave escarpment. On land, the northern rim of this escarpment is formed by a series of faults down-dropped on the south, called the Hilina fault system. Dredge hauls from a 300-metre hill on the crest of the landslide tongue at a water depth of 800 metres consists of angular fragments of fresh, glassy, tholeiitic basalt. The high vesicularity of this basalt suggests that it was erupted at a water depth several hundred metres less than that at which it was collected. Presumably, landsliding has carried the lava downward into deeper water.