Rw. Embley et Ww. Chadwick, VOLCANIC AND HYDROTHERMAL PROCESSES ASSOCIATED WITH A RECENT PHASE OFSEA-FLOOR SPREADING AT THE NORTHERN CLEFT SEGMENT - JUAN-DE-FUCA RIDGE, J GEO R-SOL, 99(B3), 1994, pp. 4741-4760
The northern portion of the Cleft segment, which is the southernmost s
egment of the Juan de Fuca Ridge, is the site of a seafloor spreading
episode during the mid-1980s that was originally discovered by the occ
urrence of anomalous hydrothermal bursts (megaplumes) and later docume
nted by seafloor mapping of new pillow mounds (NPM) that were erupted.
Several field seasons of investigations using sidescan sonar, a deep-
tow camera system, and the submersible Alvin reveal that about 30 km o
f the ridge crest is hydrothermally active and/or has experienced rece
nt volcanic and tectonic activity associated with this episode. The mo
st intense hydrothermal activity within this area and all the known hi
gh-temperature vents lie along a fissure from which a young sheet flow
(YSF) erupted. Extinct chimneys located within 100-200 m on either si
de of the fissure system represent an older (>100 years) and probably
less intense, hydrothermal regime. The bathymetry and the morphology o
f the YSF suggest that this eruption occurred over a 1-2 km section of
the fissure system that forms its eastern boundary and that it flowed
to the south. Fields of lava pillars concentrated at the margins of t
he YSF where lava probably formed when the lava stagnated near the edg
es of the flow. A comparison of sidescan data sets collected in 1982 a
nd 1987 implies that the YSF was erupted at least 7 months prior to th
e NPM, consistent with analysis of bottom photographs that suggests th
at the eruptions of the YSF and NPM were only separated by a few years
. The low hydrothermal flux over the NPM relative to the YSF suggests
a rapidly cooled underlying heat source beneath the former. We propose
that the NPM were erupted from a dike or dikes injected laterally to
the north from a magma body lying beneath the YSF. Recent evidence of
a decrease in the intensity of the overlying hydrothermal plumes sugge
sts that the system is continuing to cool down.