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The Structure of Guadeloupe, Maderas and Mt Cameroon Volcanoes and the Impact of Strike-Slip Movements Lucie Mathieu

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The Structure of Guadeloupe, Maderas and Mt Cameroon Volcanoes and the Impact of Strike-Slip Movements Lucie Mathieu The structure of Guadeloupe, Maderas and Mt Cameroon volcanoes and the impact of strike-slip movements Lucie Mathieu To cite this version: Lucie Mathieu. The structure of Guadeloupe, Maderas and Mt Cameroon volcanoes and the impact of strike-slip movements. Applied geology. Université Blaise Pascal - Clermont-Ferrand II; Trinity College Dublin, 2010. English. tel-00614727 HAL Id: tel-00614727 https://tel.archives-ouvertes.fr/tel-00614727 Submitted on 15 Aug 2011 HAL is a multi-disciplinary open access L’archive ouverte pluridisciplinaire HAL, est archive for the deposit and dissemination of sci- destinée au dépôt et à la diffusion de documents entific research documents, whether they are pub- scientifiques de niveau recherche, publiés ou non, lished or not. The documents may come from émanant des établissements d’enseignement et de teaching and research institutions in France or recherche français ou étrangers, des laboratoires abroad, or from public or private research centers. publics ou privés. Université Blaise-Pascal, Clermont-Ferrand, France - Trinity College Dublin, Ireland Ecole doctorale ED 178 "Sciences Fondamentales" Département de Géologie Laboratoire de Magmas et Volcans The structure of Guadeloupe, Maderas and Mt Cameroon volcanoes and the impact of strike-slip movements Lucie Mathieu Disciplines: Géologie, Volcanologie, Tectonique Thèse de doctorat Directeur de recherche en France: Benjamin van Wyk de Vries Directeur de recherche en Irlande: Valentin R. Troll Date de soutenance: 3 Juillet 2010 Jury: John Walsh, University College Dublin, Ireland Dave Chew, Trinity College Dublin, Ireland John Graham, Trinity College Dublin, Ireland Jean-Christophe Komorowski, Institut de Physique du Globe de Paris Alfredo Mahar Francisco Lagmay, University of the Philippines Contents Résumé - 1 Summary - 2 Chapter 1: Introduction - 3 1. Basic purpose - 3 2. Aim of the study - 3 3. Location and Morphology of the studied volcanoes - 5 3.1. Location and geodynamic context of the Guadeloupe, Mt Cameroon and - 5 Maderas volcanoes 3.2. Morphology of the Guadeloupe, Mt Cameroon and Maderas volcanoes - 6 4. Methods - 7 4.1. Field study - 7 4.2. Remote sensing data - 8 4.3. Analogue modelling - 8 5. Presentation of the manuscript - 8 Chapter 2: The geology and structure of Basse Terre Island volcanoes, - 9 Guadeloupe Archipelago, Lesser Antilles 1. Introduction - 9 2. Geological setting - 10 2.1. Lesser Antilles Arc - 10 2.2. The Guadeloupe Archipelago: Geology and local tectonics - 12 2.2.1. Geology of the archipelago - 12 2.2.2. Offshore grabens - 13 2.2.3. The Montserrat-Bouillante sinistral transtensional fault - 13 2.3. Basse Terre Island - 16 2.3.1. Alignment and age migration of volcanoes - 16 2.3.2. The volcanic Chains - 17 3. Contribution to the geological map of Guadeloupe - 23 3.1. Remote sensing data - 23 3.1.1. Presentation of data - 23 3.1.2. Bathymetric data - 24 3.1.2.1. Presentation and description of the bathymetric map - 24 3.1.2.2. Interpretation of the bathymetric data - 25 3.1.3. Analysis of Digital Elevation Models - 27 3.2. Field study - 29 3.2.1. Method - 29 3.2.1.1. Field area: - 29 3.2.1.2. Lava flow cooling joints: - 30 3.2.2. Geology of Basse Terre Island - 30 3.2.2.1. The rocks found in the rivers of western Basse Terre - 31 3.2.2.2. The outcrops found along the western shore of Basse Terre Island - 34 3.2.3. Orientation, thickness and petrology of lava flows - 35 3.2.4. Structures measured in the rivers of Basse Terre Island - 38 3.2.5. Structures measured along the western shore of Basse Terre Island - 39 3.2.5.1. Structures measured along the western shore of the Northern Chain - 39 3.2.5.2. Structures measured along the western shore of the Axial Chain - 42 3.3. The dykes of the Basse Terre Island - 44 3.3.1. Introduction - 44 3.3.2. Field data - 44 3.3.2.1. The recognition of dykes in the field - 44 3.3.2.2. Presentation of data: - 44 4. Discussion - 48 4.1. Northern Chain Volcano - 48 4.2. The Malendure and Pigeon deposits - 49 4.3. The Piton Bouillante volcano - 50 4.3.1. The volcano - 50 4.3.2. The Piton Bouillante dykes - 53 4.4. The southern part of the Axial Chain - 54 4.5. The structures of Basse Terre Island - 55 4.6. Magma migration in Basse Terre Island - 59 5. Conclusion - 59 Chapter 3: The structure of Mt Cameroon volcano, West Africa - 60 1. Introduction - 60 2. Geological setting - 60 2.1. Geological setting - 60 2.2. Mt Cameroon volcano - 61 3. Remote sensing data - 63 3.1. Slope and summit area - 63 3.2. Rift zone - 64 3.3. The Elephant Valley - 64 3.4. Boa, Tiko and Bokosso faults: - 65 3.5. Other structures and concluding remark - 67 4. Field data - 68 4.1. Summit area - 68 4.1.1. Methodology - 68 4.1.2. Dykes and open cracks - 68 4.1.3. Mt Cameroon summit peak - 71 4.2. Southern flank of the volcano - 75 4.2.1. Lithology - 75 4.2.2. River outcrops - 75 5. Discussion - 77 5.1. Mt Cameroon morphology - 77 5.2. Field data from the summit and the base of the volcano - 78 5.3. Long flank instabilities - 80 5.4. Spreading theory - 81 5.5. An asymmetric spreading? - 82 6. Conclusion - 83 Chapter 4: The structure of Maderas volcano, Nicaragua - 85 1. Introduction - 85 2. Geological setting and Maderas geology - 85 2.1. Geological setting - 85 2.2. Maderas volcano - 88 3. Remote sensing - 88 3.1. SRTM - 89 3.2. Field observations and aerial pictures - 90 3.3. Combination of methods and digitalisation of a DEM - 91 4. Field data - 93 4.1. Summit and base of the volcano - 93 4.2. Rivers - 95 5. Discussion - 97 6. Conclusion - 99 Chapter 5: Analogue Models - 101 1. Introduction - 101 2. Experimental device, material and scaling - 104 2.1. Material used - 104 2.2. Scaling - 105 2.3. Experimental device - 106 2.3.1. Model - 106 2.3.2. Setup - 107 2.3.3. Analysis and dimensionless numbers - 110 3. Results - 111 3.1. Strike-slip faults - 111 3.1.1. Brittle substratum experiments: - 112 3.1.2. Ductile substratum experiments: - 114 3.2. Transpressional faults - 115 3.2.1. Brittle substratum experiments - 115 3.2.2. Ductile substratum experiments - 117 3.3. Transtensional faults - 118 3.3.1. Brittle substratum experiments - 119 3.3.2. Ductile substratum experiments - 120 3.4. Cross-sections of transpressional and transtensional experiments - 122 3.4.1. Cross-sections of transpressional and brittle substratum experiments: - 122 3.4.2. Cross-Sections of transtensional and brittle substratum experiments: - 124 3.5. An offset between the fault and the cone summit: “Offset” experiments - 125 3.5.1. Introduction - 125 3.5.2. Strike-slip, transpressional and transtensional experiments - 126 4. Discussion - 128 4.1. Analogue models - 128 4.1.1. Fault geometry - 128 4.1.2. Fault orientation - 130 4.1.3. Ductile substratum experiments - 131 4.1.4. An offset between the cone summit and the fault zone: “offset” - 132 experiments 4.1.5. Dimensionless numbers - 133 4.2. Implications for natural examples - 135 4.2.1. Implications for the transport of magma - 135 4.2.2. Predicting collapse events - 135 4.2.3. Ore geology - 137 4.2.4. Comparison with natural examples - 137 4.2.4.1. Maderas volcano, Nicaragua: - 137 4.2.4.2. Guadeloupe volcanoes, Lesser Antilles: - 138 5. Conclusion - 141 Chapter 6: Conclusions - 142 1. General conclusions - 142 1.1. Basse Terre Island, Lesser Antilles - 142 1.2. Mt Cameroon volcano, western Africa - 143 1.3. Maderas volcano, Nicaragua - 143 1.4. Analogue models - 144 1.5. Contribution of the study - 145 2. Further work - 146 Acknowledgements - 149 Bibliography - 150 Appendix A: Glossary - 162 Appendix B: Map of the Northern Chain, Guadeloupe - 167 Appendix C: Map of the southern Northern Chain, Guadeloupe - 169 Appendix D: Map of the Mahaut town area, Guadeloupe - 171 Appendix E: Map of the Bouillante area, Guadeloupe - 173 Appendix F: Map of the Bouillante town area, Guadeloupe - 175 Appendix G: Map of the SW Axial Chain, Guadeloupe - 178 Appendix H: Stratigraphic columns, Basse Terre Island - 181 Appendix I: Orientation of horizons, Basse Terre Island - 182 Appendix J: Orientation of structures measured in Basse Terre - 184 Appendix K: Experimental parameters - 188 Appendix L: Strike-slip fault experiments (brittle substratum) - 190 Appendix M: Strike-slip fault experiments (ductile substratum) - 192 Appendix N: Transpressional experiments (brittle substratum) - 194 Appendix O: Transpressional experiments (ductile substratum) - 195 Appendix P: Transpressional experiments (numerical data) - 196 Appendix Q: Transtensional experiments (brittle substratum) - 197 Appendix R: Transtensional experiments (ductile substratum) - 198 Appendix S: Transtensional experiments (numerical data) - 199 Appendix T: Experiments; Offset introduced between the cone summit and the - 200 basal fault zone Résumé Il y a trois catégories de failles décrochantes: les failles purement décrochantes, transtensives et les failles transpressives. Ces failles ont été décrites dans bien des environnements géodynamiques et sont le type de faille le plus communément associé avec les volcans, qui se situent souvent au-dessus ou prés d’une faille décrochante. L’impact que ces mouvements régionaux ont sur la morphologie de volcans coniques a été étudié à plusieurs reprises ces dernières années. Ce travail de thèse s’intéresse à un grand nombre de catégorie de failles et de géométrie volcaniques à travers trois exemples naturels: les volcans de Guadeloupe dans les Petites Antilles, le Mt Cameroun d’Afrique de l’ouest et le volcan de Maderas, au Nicaragua. Ce projet a permis d’établir des cartes structurales de ces trois volcans peu étudiés, grâce à des études de terrain détaillées et à des observations satellites.
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