Searching for
Ron Schott's WOGE #288 felt a bit like being an explorer, following rivers across continents. Even with the last clue helping to narrow down the continent, it still took a while to find the right river. I have a renewed appreciation for the cool patterns left by meandering rivers on their floodplains. I've been casually following WOGE for some months, but I'm sure it is no coincidence that I took the time to really hunt this one down now that I'm supposed to be writing my thesis.
For those of you new to WOGE, the rules can be found
here. This is my first time hosting WOGE, so I have no idea if it will be too hard or too easy, but since the last one took more than a few days, I'm not invoking the Schott Rule.
Click on the image to see the full width of the photo (including the North arrow)
If I find this thing, Tannis, you'll force me to start a blog and thus deter me from my thesis writing... I'd say that's good motivation to start playing ;)
ReplyDeleteIt's the Bomapau and Kiriwina Island in the southern Solomon Sea, 8.56°S, 151.07°E. The islands belong to the Trobriand Archipelago, Papua New Guinea. They are flat coral atolls. Kiriwina is located between the Solomon basin in the northeast, the Trobriand Trough in the northwest, and the Woodlark Ridge in the east in a very active seismic area. Lock et al., 1987 report a subduction system north of the islands, visible in seismic data as a sediment-filled trench. On 16 July, 2000 a magnitude 7.3 earthquake occurred only 90 km north of Bomapau, later that year in November, an 8.0 event was recorded 300 km north of the archipelago. This event was the strongest earthquake in 2000 and caused a local tsunami.
ReplyDeleteLock, J., Davies, H.L., Tiffin, D.L., Murakami, F. & Kisimoto, K. (1987). The Trobriand Subduction System in the Western Solomon Sea. Geo-Marine Letters 7, 129-134
You are correct Christoph. This region is also a potentially good modern analogue for the western margin of North America (at least the Canadian part) during the Mesozoic as the foreland basin was developing.
ReplyDeleteLooking forward to WOGE #290!
Tannis, what a great area. Have you ever been there? I did not find it by searching for a long time, I just had the luck to come across it at the beginning of the search.
ReplyDeleteWoGE #290 has just been published here: http://www.paleoseismicity.org
I haven't been there yet Christoph, but would love to go there.
ReplyDelete