Causal link between Quaternary paleoclimatic changes and volcanic islands evolution

Abstract

Giant landslides and resulting tsunamis represent the main geologic hazards linked to volcanic island evolution. From offshore and onland studies, flank failures have been identified around numerous islands, in most geodynamic contexts. However, the triggering conditions are still poorly understood and several causes may act simultaneously to reach a critical threshold. Here we show that most large volume (>10 km3) landslides occur at glacial stages termination and we propose that a causal relationship between flank collapse of volcanic islands and global climatic changes has existed at least since 900 kyr. Moreover, ages reported here favour the hypothesis that major collapses occurred during the onset of glacial to interglacial transitions when sudden influx of melt water from polar ice caps causes rapid sea level rise. We propose that rapid sea level rise induces enhanced coastal erosion and sudden changes of pore pressure conditions within basal layers, which favour edifice failure.

La dorsal NE de Tenerife: hacia un modelo del origen y evolución de los rifts de islas oceánicas

“…Los factores desencadenantes de los colapsos en islas oceánicas se agrupan en internos, asociados principalmente a la fuerza ascensional del magma (Siebert, 1984;Carracedo, 1994;Carracedo et al, 1998;McGuire, 1996;Elsworth & Day, 1999), y externos, relacionados en última instancia con agentes climáticos (McMurtry et al, 2004;Quidelleur et al, 2008). Obviamente hay una amplia casuística y se puede dar una combinación de factores desencadenantes.…”

“…Estas observaciones en el Rift NE, junto con otras en Tenerife (colapso del Valle de Icod a 161 ± 13 - Gillot et al, 2001) y en otras Islas Canarias (La Palma, El Hierro- Carracedo et al, 1999b;Guillou et al, 2001), así como en otras islas oceánicas alrededor del mundo (Tahiti, Hawaii, Martinica, Guadalupe-McMurtry et al, 2004;Quidelleur et al, 2008) parecen tener en común que la interrupción de la estabilidad de grandes edificios volcánicos se produce en periodos interglaciales con elevados niveles del mar, preferentemente poco después de bruscas deglaciones. La disponibilidad de elevadas cantidades de agua en medios geológi-cos ya de por sí con elevada inestabilidad aceleraría e incrementaría el despegue de grandes masas de depósitos volcánicos.…”

Coastal evolution on volcanic oceanic islands: A complex interplay between volcanism, erosion, sedimentation, sea-level change and biogenic production

“…An aseismic movement of the Hilinia Slump system has been recorded with continuous GPS measurements and linked with a major rainfall event (Cervelli et al, 2002) so pore pressures are clearly important. Also suggesting links with pore pressure, Quidelleur et al (2008) put forward evidence for incidences of landslides occurring during glacial-induced eustatic sea-level change and Mitchell (2001Mitchell ( , 2003 outlined a transition in the morphology of edifices at > 2000 m height that may have a pore-pressure origin amongst other possibilites. Concerning links to intrusions, Clague and Denlinger (1994) suggested that the high density and weak rheology of hot olivine cumulates may contribute to the movement of the Hilina slump.…”

Aspects of marine geoscience: a review and thoughts on potential for observing active processes and progress through collaboration between the ocean sciences

“…The timing of collapse events correlates somewhat with glacial-induced eustatic sea-level change [100]. Furthermore, a transition occurs from small oceanic volcanoes, which rarely show evidence for flank collapse, and those taller than 2500 m, where collapse structures are common [101,102].…”