Earth and Planetary Science Letters 203 (2002) 607^620 www.elsevier.com/locate/epsl Kinematics of the Danakil microplate Graeme Eagles Ã, Richard Gloaguen, Cynthia Ebinger Department of Geology, Royal Holloway University of London, Egham, Surrey, TW200EX,UK Received 26 April 2002; received in revised form 5 July 2002; accepted 14 August 2002 Abstract A refinement and extrapolation of recent motion estimates for the Danakil microplate, based on ancient kinematic indicators in the Afar region, describes the evolution of a microplate in the continental realm. The Danakil horst is an elevated part of this microplate, exposing a Precambrian basement within the Afar depression, the site of the Nubia^ Somalia^Arabia triple junction. We compare evidence for strike- or oblique-slip faults in data from the Afar depression and southern Red Sea to small circles about published poles of rotation for the Danakil microplate with respect to Nubia. A reconstruction about the preferred pole reunites lengths of a Precambrian shear zone on the Nubia and Danakil sides and preserves a uniform basement fabric strike through Nubia, Danakil and Yemen. Since at least magnetic chron C5 (V11 Ma) Danakil rotated about a different pole with respect to Nubia than either Somalia or Arabia, but between chrons C5 and C2A Nubia^Danakil motion was a close approximation to Nubia^ Somalia motion. Since C2A relative motions of the Danakil microplate have been independent of movements on any of the neighbouring plate boundaries. We relate this to the onset of oceanic-type accretion within Afar. The resulting eastwards acceleration of Danakil was accommodated by westwards propagation of the Gulf of Aden rift that became the new, discrete, plate boundary between the Danakil microplate and the Somalia plate. Present-day activity suggests that the Red Sea and Aden rifts will link through Afar, thereby isolating the Danakil horst as a microcontinent on the Arabian margin. ß 2002 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved. Keywords: plate tectonics; Red Sea; Afar Depression; microplates 1. Introduction croplates. The evidence for their kinematics is best preserved in the oceans and at their margins, Plate tectonics has led to the discovery of mi- where they are often shown to have had a brief, simple, existence governed by local complications to the major plate pattern (e.g. plate boundary jumps or migration of triple junctions) [1,2]. * Corresponding author. Present address: Alfred Wegener Within deforming continental regions, where the Institute for Polar and Marine Research, Postfach 120161, age of each kinematic indicator must be indepen- Bremerhaven D-27515, Germany. Tel.: +49-471-4831-1213; dently assessed, the process of microplate forma- Fax: +49-471-4831-1149. E-mail addresses: [email protected] (G. Eagles), tion is poorly understood (e.g. [3,4]). [email protected] (R. Gloaguen), Nonetheless, due to their simplicity and predic- [email protected] (C. Ebinger). tiveness, models of plate kinematics are valuable 0012-821X / 02 / $ ^ see front matter ß 2002 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved. PII: S0012-821X(02)00916-0 EPSL 6398 7-10-02 608 G. Eagles et al. / Earth and Planetary Science Letters 203 (2002) 607^620 adjuncts to geological investigation of continental east lies the southernmost Red Sea (Fig. 1). The microplate regions, which are characteristically 300-km-wide Afar depression is a di¡use exten- complex (e.g. the Falkland Plateau, Weddellia, sional province marking a triple junction between the Australian margins, and the Caribbean). Of the Arabia, Somalia and Nubia plates, where the wide signi¢cance are the minor motions of small Red Sea (Arabia^Nubia), the Gulf of Aden (Ara- plates at the Mesozoic to Recent Paci¢c margin of bia^Somalia) and the Main Ethiopian rift (Soma- Antarctica (e.g. [5]) that have long hindered at- lia^Nubia) plate boundaries meet. tempts to close the global plate circuit with the The Danakil horst was ¢rst suspected of being Paci¢c Ocean. In turn, this has a¡ected thoughts part of a microplate when reconstructions of the on hot-spot ¢xity and absolute palaeo-plate mo- Red Sea in which it remains ¢xed with respect to tions (e.g. [6]). Nubia caused it to overlap with Arabia (e.g. [7,9]). The Afar depression, part of the Oligocene^Re- Courtillot and others [10,11] suggested that this cent Afro^Arabian rift systems of NE Africa, is overlap is the result of the variable stretching in one of the few localities worldwide where one may continental crust of variable rheology by propa- study the processes of microplate formation on gating rifts. The relative movements required for land. At its eastern edge, the Danakil horst is a Danakil to lessen this overlap remain poorly narrow, NW-trending ridge of Precambrian base- known as kinematic data, until recently they ment partly covered by Oligocene^Recent lavas of have been restricted to Djibouti in SE Afar, a the Afar £ood basalt province (e.g. [7,8]). Further small part of the Afar depression. As a result, the Danakil^Afar region, which is probably also the best study locale for the early stages of con- tinental breakup above a mantle plume, still lacks a well-constrained plate tectonic history. We analysed satellite, air photo, seismic re£ec- tion, magnetic, gravity, topographic and geologi- cal data throughout the region shown in Fig. 1. We propose a new post-Oligocene plate kinematic model which is consistent with published global plate movements, and which can describe struc- tural data from the Danakil^Afar region. We dis- cuss the model in the context of formation of a microcontinent. 2. Regional tectonic setting Two parallel NNW-trending rifts, the broad subaerial Afar depression and the southern Red Sea, had formed by Early Miocene times as Ara- bia separated from Africa (e.g. [12,13]; Fig. 1). Plate reconstructions and geodetic data show a Fig. 1. 2-min-gridded topography. Manda^Goba’ad: trace of NE^SW opening direction in the Red Sea and transform between northern and southern Afar. Shaded re- the Gulf of Aden parts of the Afar Depression. gion: Danakil microplate [27], thick dashed black line: Da- The NNE-trending Main Ethiopian rift is extend- nakil horst, dashed-outline box: domain of reconstructions ing in a direction N108‡E at 4 mm a31 [14], con- in Fig. 2. Inset: Present plate tectonic setting; grey: extend- sistent with predictions of global plate motion ing regions, stars: instantaneous opening poles for Red Sea (RS [9]) and East African Rift (CG99 [15]). NUB: Nubia data ([15]; Fig. 1). The NW-striking Manda^Go- plate, SOM: Somalia plate, ARA: Arabia plate. ba’ad fault zone acts as an incipient plate bound- EPSL 6398 7-10-02 G. Eagles et al. / Earth and Planetary Science Letters 203 (2002) 607^620 609 ary connecting the southern and northern parts of Although the model reunites African and Arabian the rift system in Afar which have been approxi- Precambrian shear zones expressed in a digital mated to East African and Red Sea rifting, re- terrain model, few of these features can be posi- spectively (e.g. [13,16]). NE-directed sea£oor tively identi¢ed as throughgoing on Danakil itself. spreading in the Gulf of Aden propagated west- Le Pichon and Francheteau [9] determined in- ward towards and, recently, into the Afar de- dependent motions of Danakil by composition pression since 25 Ma [13]. NE-directed sea£oor from total reconstructions of the southernmost spreading in the Red Sea commenced at V4Ma Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, but had to ([17]; Fig. 1). make assumptions about the shape of the conti- Sichler’s model [18] for the opening of the Afar nent^ocean boundaries in both systems. To avoid depression proposes that Danakil moved like a doing likewise, Chu and Gordon [27] analysed the crank-arm between Euler poles at its northwestern most recent plate movements in the Red Sea re- and southeastern extremities, as though somehow gion, based on sea£oor spreading rates and on ‘pinned’ there to the separating Nubia and Arabia earthquake slip-vectors. As well as showing the plates, respectively. Others [19,20] suggested the approximate shape of the present-day Danakil eastward rotation of Danakil was accompanied microplate they gave Euler poles for motions in by a similar, but opposite, movement of the the region since magnetic anomaly chron C2A Ali^Sabieh block (Fig. 1) to the south. The re- (about 3.2 Ma). These poles show that Danakil stricted geographical focus of later studies and still has resolvable motions with respect to both their consideration of only Pliocene^Recent faults Nubia and Arabia, and that the crank-arm model have given rise to con£icting assessments of the is not applicable to Danakil’s post-C2A tectonic crank-arm model. Souriot and Brun [21] found setting. However, the poles’ 95% con¢dence ellip- the crank-arm model to be consistent with fault ses contain a set of statistically signi¢cant alter- patterns in SE Afar. Neogene fault kinematic data natives that have rather di¡erent implications for in the Main Ethiopian rift (e.g. [22]) do not show Afro^Arabian rift kinematics and the evolution of the strike-slip or highly oblique-slip motions pre- the Afar plume province. This paper examines dicted by the crank-arm model. Three studies [23^ those alternatives. 25] have attempted to relate block movements constrained by palaeomagnetic data from a few locales in SE Afar to ‘duelling’ rifts propagating 3. Method into Afar from the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden. The model of Acton and Stein [24] is consistent We assume initially that the Danakil horst with the fault study in [21] but not with the crank- should ¢t tightly to the west Afar margin in re- arm model.