Mountains in the sea

Tony Watts University of Oxford

A perspective view of predicted bathymetry and ship track data in the south-central Pacific Ocean.

Collaborators: David Sandwell (Scripps), Pl Wessel (Hawaii), Walter Smith (NOAA), Christine Peirce (Durham), Ingo Grevemeyer (IFM-GEOMAR)

Shell Public Lecture Series, Geological Society of London, 11 November 2009

Outline of the Talk

The Challenger expedition Ocean islands: Atolls and Guyots Seamounts - Number, distribution and age Growth and decay Seamounts, the environment and society

H. M. S. CHALLENGER Shortening sail to sound

The H.M.S. CHALLENGER expedition (1872-76) and John Murrays 1911 map of the Atlantic Ocean floor

Sounding and trawling on the CHALLENGER

The bottom of the Atlantic Ocean along the 40o N parallel according to Murray (1911)

5 km

Smooth and featureless, except around the Azores

The Azores
Pico (2351 m)

A Agroup groupof of0-8 0-8Ma Mavolcanoes volcanoesthat that rise up >7 km above the regional Mid-Ocean rise up above the regional depth Trench Trench Ridge depth the surrounding seafloor. of of the surrounding seafloor. Global Volcanism Program The Azores make up 9 of Together up 9 of theabout 47 the worlds 1770make Ocean Islands, worlds 1770 ocean islands. of which are active
worlds 1770 ocean islands.

San Miguel

Darwins (1842) theory

Volcanic island with lagoon and barrier reef

Most inactive ocean islands are volcanic in origin and have coral reefs.

Lagoon with barrier reef

http://darwin-online.org.uk/

Volcanic island with fringing reef Barrier reef and lagoon

Moorea (Society Islands) 1.5 Ma

Ocean island with a barrier reef, lagoon and (central) volcano

Bora Bora (Society Islands) 3.3 Ma

Aratika (Tuamotus 42-47 Ma)

Barrier reef and lagoon = Atoll

Atolls form by the upward growth of a coral reef on a sinking submarine volcano

Origin of atolls

The seafloor increases its depth because the oceanic crust is created at a mid-ocean ridge and gets cooler and, hence, denser with age.

Harry Hess
Discoverer of the first Mountain in the Sea?

Hess found a large flat-topped feature in the central Pacific Ocean during WW II which he called a guyot

Chesley Bonestell (1888-1986) American painter

The central Pacific with the ocean removed

Origin of guyots
Hess suggested that guyots were once volcanic islands that had been flattened by wave action.
Kimmeridge Bay, Dorset

Gran Canaria (Canary Islands)

Funck & Schminke (1996)

Mountains in the sea

Ocean Islands like Hawaii are as tall as Everest and as wide as the Alps..

Ocean islands, atolls and guyots suggest that the seafloor should be littered with volcanoes some of which are growing upwards and have not yet made it to the surface and others which were once at the surface and have since sunk below it.
Ocean Island

Seamounts

So, what do we actually find on the ocean floor?

Technologies to explore the ocean floor

Ships
Satellites

e.g. multibeam echo-sounder (swath)

Seamount

Radar altimeter

~5000 research cruises (~400 ship yrs), ~6 satellite altimeter missions (~60 satellite yrs)

Global Topography

Seamounts of the west-central Pacific Ocean

Guyot

Mid-Pacific Mountains

4 km 100 km

How many seamounts are there?

Height above the regional seafloor depth
(Ben Nevis = 1344 m)
750-1000 m 10,553 1000-1500 m 8,437 >1500 m 14,594

Height 100-750 m = 185,901

Seamount census = 219,485

What are seamounts made of?

Seamounts are made mostly of basaltic lavas, volcanoclastic sediments and rock debris (e.g. gabbro ejecta). Most are inactive.
Brimstone Pit (550 m), Mariana Arc Pillow lavas, Loihi, Hawaii

Vesicular basalt, Tenerife

Some are active. They are spectacular sights that involve the jettisoning of rocks, sulfurous clouds, and volcanic gases.

QuickTime an d a decompressor are need ed to see this p icture .

Iron oxide crust, Bounty

NOAA - Embley et al. (2006)

The structure of seamounts

(from deep seismic sounding)
Sea-Level

Tenerife Canary islands

1 sec

Seafloor ~ 3 km

Buried edge of the edifice of the Tenerife volcano ~9 km Top of Oceanic Crust

Seamount shapes

Marquesas Islands

Society Islands

Tuamotu Islands

Tubai Islands

Seamount Catalog - http://earthref.org/SBN/

How do seamounts form?

The hotspot hypothesis

Hotspot

Hawaiian-Emperor Seamount Chain

Midway

Hawaiian bend

Kauai

There are 4 main long-lived (>70 Myr) hotspots in the Pacific, 3 of which can be backtracked to an oceanic plateau

What about the many other seamounts?

The crack hypothesis

Japan

Petit-spots

Hirano et al. (2008)

Mantle convection and extension (e.g. due to slab pull) cause the plates to crack, allowing magma in the mantle to find a pathway to the sea-floor.

Capturing the growth of a seamount

1999 Survey

2005 Survey

Difference

Staudigel et al. (2006)

Collapse and Decay

The Taney Seamounts, off Monterey Bay, CA

NW

SE

Clague et al. (2000)

How old are seamounts?

There are only ~350 sample sites!

High sea-level (+60-120 m)

Warm climate (+~15 oC)

?Pacific superplume

What happens to a seamount when it reaches a trench?

Nicaragua

Panama

Overriding North American Plate

Trench

Von Huene et al (2000)

Subducting Cocos Plate

Seamounts may act as barriers during earthquakes.

e.g. the June 2001 Southern Peru, Mw = 8.4 earthquake Largest earthquake since 1961 75 killed, including 26 by a tsunami. 2,687 injured.

Basilica Catedral, Arequipa

A line of seamounts are entering the trench

Robinson et al. (2006)

Seamounts scatter tsunami waves and may focus their run-up along certain segments of a coastline
Andreanof Island 1996 earthquake

Cape Mendocino

Kodiak-Bowie Seamounts Musician Seamounts

Mofjeld et al. (2004)

Seamounts are biological hotspots

Catch or sightings: Azores
Big-eye tuna

Dolphin

Corys shearwater (predator) Skipjack tuna

Vents and turbulence on seamounts provide nutrients and some of our favourite fish are found on seamounts

Pitcher et al. (in press, 2009, Special Issue of Oceanography)

But, there is the (sad) tale of the Graveyard Seamounts..

Unfished
Gothic

Fished
Morgue

Diabolical

Scroll

Clark & Rowden (2009)

So, we need to manage and protect seamounts Global census on marine life on seamounts - http://censeam.niwa.co.nz/

What limits our exploration of seamounts? Field data!!

Existing ship track coverage in the South-Central Pacific Ocean We know the surface of the Moon, Mars - and now Mercury - better than we do the seafloor of the South Pacific Ocean!

How many seamounts are there that remain to be discovered?

There are ~30,000 large (1.0-1.5 km) seamounts and numerous smaller ones that remain to be discovered! Satellites have found all the large (>2 km) seamounts, but few of the small ones Ships have found most of the small (<2 km) seamounts and many of the large ones

Data sources: Wessel (2001), Hillier & Watts (2006)

Why is it important that we find all the seamounts?

On 8 January 2005 the USS San Francisco, a nuclear-powered attack submarine, crashed into a 2 km high uncharted seamount
Sub ran aground en route from Guam to Brisbane, Australia

One sailor killed, 115 injured

Crash depth ~160 m, speed 33 knots, sonar measured a depth of 2000 m 4 minutes before crash 30-hour trip back to Guam, crew managed to keep the sub from sinking $1 billion repair bill - would have paid for ~750 research cruises !

Source: The New York Times

What next?
More shipboard swath bathymetry, sample and deep seismic data The European Space Agency CRYOSAT satellite altimeter: Launch later this month.. Better collaboration between geologists, oceanographers and biologists More seamount management and protection Public awareness and participation in finding seamounts?

We need.