Richard J. Blakely

Approximating edges of source bodies from magnetic or gravity anomalies

Cordell and Grauch (1982, 1985) discussed a technique to estimate the location of abrupt lateral changes in magnetization or mass density of upper crustal rocks. The final step of their procedure is to identify maxima on a contoured map of horizontal gradient magnitudes. We attempt to automate their final step. Our method begins with gridded magnetic or gravity anomaly data and produces a plan view of inferred boundaries of magnetic or gravity sources. The method applies to both local surveys and to continent‐wide compilations of magnetic and gravity data (e.g., Zietz, 1982; Simpson et al., 1983a; Kane et al., 1982).

Fore-arc migration in Cascadia and its neotectonic significance

Neogene deformation, paleomagnetic rotations, and sparse geodetic data suggest the Cascadia fore arc is migrating northward along the coast and breaking up into large rotating blocks. Deformation occurs mostly around the margins of a large, relatively aseismic Oregon coastal block composed of thick, accreted seamount crust. This 400-km-long block is moving slowly clockwise with respect to North America about a Euler pole in eastern Washington, thus increasing convergence rates along its leading edge near Cape Blanco, and creating an extensional volcanic arc on its trailing edge. Northward movement of the block breaks western Washington into smaller, seismically active blocks and compresses them against the Canadian Coast Mountains restraining bend. Arc-parallel transport of fore-arc blocks is calculated to be up to 9 mm/yr, sufficient to produce damaging earthquakes in a broad deformation zone along block margins.

The northern Nevada rift: Regional tectono-magmatic relations and middle Miocene stress direction

As defined by the most recent aeromagnetic surveys, the north-northwest-trending northern Nevada rift zone extends for at least 500 km from southern Nevada to the Oregon Nevada border. At several places along the rift, the magnetic anomaly is clearly related to north-northwest-trending dikes and flows that, based on new radiometric dating, erupted between 17 and 14 Ma and probably during an even shorter time interval. The tectonic significance of the rift is dramatized by its length, its coincidence in time and space (at its northern terminus) with the oldest silicic caldera complex along the Yellowstone hot-spot trend, and its parallelism with the subduction zone along the North American coast prior to the establishment of the San Andreas fault. The northern Nevada rift is also equivalent in age, trend, and composition to feeder dikes that fed the main eruptive pulse (∼95% volumetrically) off the Columbia River flood basalts in northern Oregon ∼15.5-16.5 Ma. Because of these similarities, both regions are considered to be part of an enormous lithospheric rift that propagated rapidly south-southeast and north-northwest, respectively, from a central mantle plume. The site of the initial breaching of the North America plate by this plume is probably the McDermitt volcanic center at the north end off the rift near the Oregon-Nevada border. The present north-northwest trend of the rift and its internal elements, such as dikes and lava-filled grabens, record the orientation of the arc-normal extensional stress in this back-arc region at the time of emplacement. Paleomagnetic evidence presented by others and interpreted to indicate block rotations at three sample localities is not consistent with either a rotation of dikes within the rift or with a regional rotation of the entire rift. The present north-northwest trend of the rift reflects the state of stress in the Basin and Range during middle Miocene time and is consistent with stress indicators of similar age throughout the Basin and Range and Rio Grande rift provinces.

Subduction-zone magnetic anomalies and implications for hydrated forearc mantle

Continental mantle in subduction zones is hydrated by release of water from the underlying oceanic plate. Magnetite is a significant byproduct of mantle hydration, and forearc mantle, cooled by subduction, should contribute to long-wavelength magnetic anomalies above subduction zones. We test this hypothesis with a quantitative model of the Cascadia convergent margin, based on gravity and aeromagnetic anomalies and constrained by seismic velocities, and find that hydrated mantle explains an important disparity in potential-field anomalies of Cascadia. A comparison with aeromagnetic data, thermal models, and earthquakes of Cascadia, Japan, and southern Alaska suggests that magnetic mantle may be common in forearc settings and thus magnetic anomalies may be useful in mapping hydrated mantle in convergent margins worldwide.

Location, structure, and seismicity of the Seattle fault zone, Washington: Evidence from aeromagnetic anomalies, geologic mapping, and seismic-reflection data

A high-resolution aeromagnetic survey of the Puget Lowland shows details of the Seattle fault zone, an active but largely concealed east-trending zone of reverse faulting at the southern margin of the Seattle basin. Three elongate, east-trending magnetic anomalies are associated with north- dipping Tertiary strata exposed in the hanging wall; the magnetic anomalies indicate where these strata continue beneath glacial deposits. The northernmost anomaly, a narrow, elongate magnetic high, precisely correlates with magnetic Miocene volcanic conglomerate. The middle anomaly, a broad magnetic low, correlates with thick, nonmagnetic Eocene and Oligocene marine and fluvial strata. The southern anomaly, a broad, complex magnetic high, correlates with Eocene volcanic and sedimentary rocks. This tripartite package of anomalies is especially clear over Bainbridge Island west of Seattle and over the region east of Lake Washington. Although attenuated in the intervening region, the pattern can be correlated with the mapped strike of beds following a northwest-striking anticline beneath Seattle. The aeromagnetic and geologic data define three main strands of the Seattle fault zone identified in marine seismic-reflection profiles to be subparallel to mapped bedrock trends over a distance of >50 km. The locus of faulting coincides with a diffuse zone of shallow crustal seismicity and the region of uplift produced by the M 7 Seattle earthquake of a.d. 900–930.

The use of curvature in potential-field interpretation

Potential-field anomalies can be transformed into special functions that form peaks and ridges over isolated sources. All special functions have a common mathematical form over an isolated source, which leads to a common equation for estimating the source depth from the peak value and the curvature at the peak. Model-specific special functions, usually calculated from a transformed version of a potential field, are used to estimate the locations of very specific source types. Model-independent special functions calculated from an observed or transformed potential field can be used to estimate the locations of a variety of source types. Vertical integration is a particularly useful transformation for reducing the effects of noise and increasing the coherency of solutions from model-independent special functions. For gridded data, the eigenvalues and eigenvectors of the curvature matrix associated with a quadratic surface that is fitted to a special function within 3 × 3 windows can be used to locate the sources and estimate their depths and strikes. Discrete source locations estimated in this manner can be connected into lines that follow contacts, faults, and other mappable features based on distance and azimuth criteria. These concepts are demonstrated on aeromagnetic data from the Albuquerque basin of New Mexico, USA.

Testing the use of aeromagnetic data for the determination of Curie depth in California

Using California as a test region, we have examined the feasibility of using Curie-isotherm depths, estimated from magnetic anomalies, as a proxy for lithospheric thermal structure. Our method follows previous studies by dividing a regional aeromagnetic database into overlapping subregions and analyzing the power-density spectrum of each subregion, but we have improved on previous studies in two important ways: We increase subregion dimensions in a stepwise manner until long-wavelength anomalies are appropriately sampled, and each subregion spectrum determined from the magnetic anomalies is manually fit with a theoretical expression that directly yields the depth to the bottom of the magnetic layer. Using this method, we have obtained Curie-isotherm depths for California that show a general inverse correlation with measured heat flow, as expected. The Coast Ranges of California are characterized by high heat flow (80–85 mW∕ m2 ) and shallow Curie depths (20–30 km) , whereas the Great Valley has low heat f...

Holocene fault scarps near Tacoma, Washington, USA

Airborne laser mapping confirms that Holocene active faults traverse the Puget Sound metropolitan area, northwestern continental United States. The mapping, which detects forest-floor relief of as little as 15 cm, reveals scarps along geophysical lineaments that separate areas of Holocene uplift and subsidence. Along one such line of scarps, we found that a fault warped the ground surface between A.D. 770 and 1160. This reverse fault, which projects through Tacoma, Washington, bounds the southern and western sides of the Seattle uplift. The northern flank of the Seattle uplift is bounded by a reverse fault beneath Seattle that broke in A.D. 900–930. Observations of tectonic scarps along the Tacoma fault demonstrate that active faulting with associated surface rupture and ground motions pose a significant hazard in the Puget Sound region.

Interpretation of the Seattle uplift, Washington, as a passive-roof duplex

We interpret seismic lines and a wide variety of other geological and geophysical data to suggest that the Seattle uplift is a passive-roof duplex. A passive-roof duplex is bounded top and bottom by thrust faults with opposite senses of vergence that form a triangle zone at the leading edge of the advancing thrust sheet. In passive-roof duplexes the roof thrust slips only when the floor thrust ruptures. The Seattle fault is a south-dipping reverse fault forming the leading edge of the Seattle uplift, a 40-km-wide fold-and-thrust belt. The recently discovered, north-dipping Tacoma reverse fault is interpreted as a back thrust on the trailing edge of the belt, making the belt doubly vergent. Floor thrusts in the Seattle and Tacoma fault zones, imaged as discontinuous reflections, are interpreted as blind faults that flatten updip into bedding plane thrusts. Shallow monoclines in both the Seattle and Tacoma basins are interpreted to overlie the leading edges of thrust-bounded wedge tips advancing into the basins. Across the Seattle uplift, seismic lines image several shallow, short-wavelength folds exhibiting Quaternary or late Quaternary growth. From reflector truncation, several north-dipping thrust faults (splay thrusts) are inferred to core these shallow folds and to splay upward from a shallow roof thrust. Some of these shallow splay thrusts ruptured to the surface in the late Holocene. Ages from offset soils in trenches across the fault scarps and from abruptly raised shorelines indicate that the splay, roof, and floor thrusts of the Seattle and Tacoma faults ruptured about 1100 years ago. Manuscript received 9 September 2003.

Subducted seamounts and recent earthquakes beneath the central Cascadia forearc

Bathymetry and magnetic anomalies indicate that a seamount on the Juan de Fuca plate has been subducted beneath the central Cascadia accretionary complex and is now located ∼45 km landward of the deformation front. Passage of this seamount through the accretionary complex has resulted in a pattern of uplift followed by subsidence that has had a profound influence on slope morphology, gas hydrate stability, and sedimentation. Based on potential-field data and a new three-dimensional seismic velocity model, we infer that this is the most recent of several seamounts subducted over the past several million years beneath this segment of Cascadia. More deeply subducted seamounts may be responsible for recent earthquake activity on the plate boundary in this region and for along-strike variations in the thickness of the subduction channel, which may affect coupling across the plate boundary.