Rate of collisional deformation in Kamchatsky Peninsula, Kamchatka

• Published in: Geotectonics
• Main Authors: Kozhurin, A. I., Pinegina, T. K., Ponomareva, Vera V., Zelenin, E. A., Mikhailyukova, P. G.
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: MAIK Nauka/Interperiodica 2014
• Subjects: Kamchatka
• Online Access: https://oceanrep.geomar.de/id/eprint/28469/; https://oceanrep.geomar.de/id/eprint/28469/1/Kozhurin_et_%20al_%202014_en%20.pdf; https://doi.org/10.1134/S001685211402006X

Detailed data are discussed on the rate of Holocene horizontal and vertical movements along a fault in the southeastern Kamchatsky Peninsula, which is situated between the converging Aleutian and Kamchatka island arcs. The fault is the northern boundary of the block invading into the peninsula under pressure of the Komandorsky Block of the Aleutian arc. The rate of right-lateral slip along the fault was increasing in the Holocene and reached 18–19 mm/yr over the last 2000 years and 20 mm/yr by contemporary time. Comparison of these estimates with those that follow from offsets of older rocks also indicates acceleration of horizontal movements along the fault from the early Quaternary to the present. The results obtained from rates of GPS station migration show that about half the rate of the northwestern drift of the Komandorsky Block is consumed for movement of the block of the southern side of the fault. The remainder of movement of the Komandorsky Block is consumed for movements (probably, underthrusting) at the eastern continental slope of the Kamchatsky Peninsula.