INDONESIAN JOURNAL on GEOSCIENCE the Significance Of
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Indonesian Journal on Geoscience Vol. 7 No. 3 December 2020: 291-303 INDONESIAN JOURNAL ON GEOSCIENCE Geological Agency Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources Journal homepage: hp://ijog.geologi.esdm.go.id ISSN 2355-9314, e-ISSN 2355-9306 The Significance of the Banda Sea: Tectonic Deformation Review in Eastern Sulawesi Adept Titu-Eki1,2 and Robert Hall1 1SE Asia Research Group, Department of Earth Science, Royal Holloway University of London, Egham, Surrey TW20 0EX, United Kingdom 2Department of Mining Engineering, University of Nusa Cendana, Jln. Adisucipto, Penfui, Kupang - West Timor, Nusa Tenggara Timur 85228, Indonesia Corresponding author: [email protected] Manuscript received: April, 10, 2019; revised: December, 19, 2019; approved: April, 13, 2020; available online: November, 5, 2020 Abstract - The geology of eastern Sulawesi is widely known for its complexity due to multiple deformation stages. The geology on land has been studied excessively, but little assessment has been made on the offshore geology, thus the geological evolution of the area remains a subject of controversy. A thorough observation of high multibeam ba- thymetry dataset offshore and SRTM dataset onshore provides an understanding on the geological features relating to the tectonic deformation. Exquisite morphological features include carbonate buildups and gravitational collapse dominating the shelf areas whereas distinct form of ridges and seamount exists in the offshore. Structural features in this area including the major Tolo Thrust and South Sula Fault varied structural lineations on land with several polygonal extensional faulting and accretionary wedge on the west of the North Banda Sea. The existence of these features may indicate that the area was majorly deformed during Neogene, specifically relating to the opening of the Banda Sea due to the subduction rollback of Banda. Keywords: tectonic deformation, Sulawesi, Banda Sea, multibeam, SRTM, subduction rollback © IJOG - 2020. All right reserved How to cite this article: Titu-Eki, A. and Hall, R., 2020. The Significance of the Banda Sea: Tectonic Deformation Review in Eastern Sulawesi. Indo nesian Journal on Geoscience, 7 (3), p.291-303. DOI: 10.17014/ijog.7.3.291-303 Introduction and collided with the Eurasian Plate in the Late Oligocene - Early Miocene (Hall, 2002 and 2012). Background This collision has often been interpreted as an arc- Eastern Sulawesi is situated near the converg- continent collision, resulting in the complexity of ing margins of Eurasia, Australia, and Pacific Sulawesi. During this period, an Australian prom- Plates, and has an intriguingIJOG geological complex- ontory termed the Sula Spur (now fragmented), ity with inadequate understanding of the structural collided with Sulawesi which resulted in struc- styles relating to the formation and interaction of tures viable for hydrocarbon trapping (Davies, small plates and subduction zones. The significant 1990; Hasanusi et al., 2004) and had immensely development of Sulawesi started in the Neogene deformed Sulawesi and its surroundings. period. The Australian continental margin had The collision of the Sula Spur with Sulawesi drifted northwards after the Gondwana breakup was initially thought to have occurred by move- Indexed by: SCOPUS (Q3) 291 Indonesian Journal on Geoscience, Vol. 7 No. 3 December 2020: 291-303 ments along major left-lateral strike-slip faults East Arm, and that the faults in this area are (Klompe, 1954; Audley-Charles, 1974; Hamil- actually right-lateral strike-slip faults (known ton, 1979). Stratigraphic similarities have been as the Balantak Fault) that extends towards the used to link the Banggai-Sula block with the northern Sula platform offshore (Ferdian et al., Misool Island (Audley-Charles, 1974), sug- 2010; Watkinson et al., 2011). gesting that the Banggai-Sula microcontinent Apart from the previous dominant geological was sliced from the Bird Head region in Papua observations on land, geophysical and remote (Hamilton, 1979), and moved westward ±2,500 sensing studies offshore and onshore both km from its origin place in Central Papua (Ger- proved value in contributing to the knowledge rard et al., 1988). This assumption was recently of the area. However, since most parts of eastern disapproved as new studies confirm the absence Sulawesi are still underexplored, there are still of such fault in eastern Sulawesi, yet indicated uncertainties concerning its development. This major extension caused by subduction rollback study produces interpretations of high quality forming the Banda Arc in Early Miocene (Spak- multibeam bathymetry offshore and SRTM data man and Hall, 2010; Rudyawan and Hall, 2012; onshore to provide new insights on the devel- Hall and Sevastjanova, 2012; Hall 2012). This opment of this highly complex area, namely extension had also led to the formation of the to evaluate the evolution of eastern Sulawesi North Banda Sea, in Middle to Late Miocene by identifying major tectonic events through (Hinschberger et al., 2000). remote sensing observations. The studied area The Batui Thrust of the East Arm marks the encompasses the east and SE Arm of Sulawesi, Early Miocene collision zone which was assumed Banggai-Sula islands, parts of Buru, and the to extend from the northern East Arm (Poh Head), North Banda Sea (Figure 1). creating a fold and thrust belt along the coast towards the southern East Arm (Sukamto, 1990; Geological Settings Hasanusi et al., 2004; Hasanusi et al., 2015). Indonesia is situated in the meeting point of Recent studies have shown the absence of the four tectonically active plates. The convergence continuity of the Batui Thrust in the northern of Eurasia, India-Australia, and Pacific plates 110o E 115o E 120o E 125o E 130o E 135o E N South China Sea N o 5 Celebes Sea Pacific Ocean BORNEO North Arm Halmahera o 0 Molucca Sea East Arm Bird’s Head Banggai-Sula SULAWESI North Banda Sea Seram Buru Southwest Arm Southeast Arm S Java Sea o 5 South Banda Sea IJOGWeber Basin JAVA Flores Timor S o Bathymetry 10 Indian Ocean 5000 m 1000 m 0 120 240 480 km Figure 1. Location of the approximate studied area (red box) with bathymetry contours. 292 The Significance of the Banda Sea: Tectonic Deformation Review in Eastern Sulawesi (A. Titu-Eki and R. Hall) are the main cause of such intense seismicity the complexity of Sulawesi. It has resulted in the and volcanism occurring in the area. It develops distribution of various rocks on the island seen numerous subduction zones of the microplates today (Figure 2). The East and Southeast Sulawesi and generates the major strike-slip Sorong Fault Arms contain continental terrain deriving from in eastern Indonesia (Hall 2009). Hall (2002) the northern margin of Australia, together with claimed these plate boundaries shifted rapidly the ophiolitic complex which originated from during Cenozoic which dates most of the major the mid-oceanic ridge in the Pacific Plate (Mar- tectonic events in history. tosuwito, 2012). The East Arm is dominated by Indonesia is formed by fragments of the Gond- ultramafic and subsidiary basic rocks which are wana supercontinent which rifted towards the known as the Eastern Sulawesi Ophiolite Belt Eurasian subduction margin where the Cenozoic (ESOB) (Simandjuntak, 1986). The major mass collision of this margin is the key event for the trace of ophiolites extends from the East Arm to present day geology. The major plate convergence the SE Arm and terminates at the Lawanopo Fault had resulted in many important extension periods Zone. This fault has been inactive since the end which form new basins and subsidence assumedly of Pleistocene (Natawidjaja and Daryono, 2015). driven subduction. It is also the main reason for The structural trend of East Sulawesi Arm is Indonesia to be dominated by Cenozoic-age rock. oriented E-W to NE-SW where most of the rock These events vastly occur in eastern Indonesia contact lies dominantly on faults, like igneous where arc-ophiolitic crust and young ocean basins rocks thrusting over the Eocene and Middle Mio- are dominant, whilst western Indonesia is mostly cene carbonates (Sukamto, 1990). The western underlain by continental crust (Hall, 2009). East Arm structural lineaments changes to a NW- The Cenozoic collision has often been inter- SE trend (Rudyawan and Hall, 2012), displaying preted as an arc-continent collision, resulting in metamorphic core complex in the area with a 118o E 120o E 122o E 124o E 126o E Sedimentary and volcanic rocks N 2o N Holocene alluvium Quaternary-Neogene limestone Sulawesi Sea Quaternary-Neogene clastic sediments Quaternary-Neogene volcanics Basement rocks Neogene igneous intrusives Neogene metamorphics o Pre-Neogene rocks 0 Maluku Sea 2o S Strait Banda Sea IJOGMakassar 0 100 200 km 6o S Figure 2. Simplified geological map of Sulawesi showing the distribution of Neogene and Quaternary rocks (from Nugraha, 2016). 293 Indonesian Journal on Geoscience, Vol. 7 No. 3 December 2020: 291-303 northward transition in topographic style which the South East Arm (Katili, 1978; Fortuin; et al., recently known to be marked by two detachment 1990 Milsom, 2000). This similarity suggests that faults (Spencer, 2011). The Southeast Arm experi- both islands derived from the same continental enced many deformations after the collision to the margin and that Buru considerably rotated east- Australian margin, where one of them is shown by ward away from the east Sulawesi orogeny to the development of the Matano Fault. This fault is its current position (Milsom, 2000). The narrow situated in northern Southeast Arm and extends ap- and similar margin between eastern Mangoli proximately 170 km towards the W-NW (Ahmad, Island (Sula) with the northern Buru Sea could 1977). The Matano Fault is a left-lateral strike-slip suggest that both islands were separated during fault and is previously assumed to show genetic the spreading of the North Banda Sea (Rudyawan relation with the Sorong Fault deriving from Bird and Hall, 2012), which is consistent with the Buru Head Papua (Ahmad, 1977; Hamilton, 1979).