Profiler-sonobuoy measurements in the South China Sea basin
Analyses of single-channel seismic reflection profiles, and wide-angle reflection and refraction data from sonobuoys, indicate that the deep part of the South China Sea basin is typically oceanic in structure, except that layer 2 is about 1 km thicker than usual and layer 3 is only about half the usual thickness. The top of layer 2 has a rough upper surface and becomes deeper in the northern part of the basin, where it is overlain by sediments of velocity 1.7--3.8 km/s up to 3 km thick. A 6-km-thick sequence of sediments fills a basement depression just north of the outer subsurface (peripheral) ridge of the Sunda shelf. Thick sediments were measured at the outer parts of the Sunda shelf, Palawan shelf, Northeast Borneo shelf, and in the Taiwan straits south of the Penghu-Peikang basement high. The Manila trench is divided into two sections, a sediment-filled trench between southernmost Taiwan and Stewart bank off central northern Luzon and a topographic trench between Stewart bank southward into the Mindoro straits. Burial of part of the trench by sediments that thicken to the north and the thick sediment cover of the northern South China Sea basin indicate provenance from the north. The northern margin of the South China Sea basin is predominantly a zone of tension the southern margin is predominantly a zone of compression, the western margin may be a zone of shear, and the eastern margin is a subduction zone. It seems probable that the southern margin of the basin, called the Reed bank crustal block, was formerly attached to mainland Asia. Sometime during the Paleogene the Reed bank crustal block broke away from the continent, and new sea floor was created between the southeastward migrating block and the Asian mainland. Old ocean crust in front of the advancing block was subducted along the northwestern sides of Borneo and Palawan. Subduction ceased in the early Miocene with the collision of the crustal block and the Borneo-Palawan isthmian ridge.
- Research Organization:
- Lamont-Doherty Geological Observatory of Columbia University, Palisades, New York 10964
- OSTI ID:
- 5983717
- Journal Information:
- J. Geophys. Res.; (United States), Journal Name: J. Geophys. Res.; (United States) Vol. 84:B7; ISSN JGREA
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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