Source identification of Middle Age extreme event deposits in the Lesser Antilles using forward numerical modeling of tsunami

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Louise Cordrie ◽  
Audrey Gailler ◽  
Nathalie Feuillet
Keyword(s):  
Puerto Rico ◽  
Extreme Event ◽  
Virgin Islands ◽  
Lesser Antilles ◽  
Greater Antilles ◽  
Seismic Cycle ◽  
The Caribbean ◽  
Run Up ◽  
Bathymetric Grids ◽  
Northern Segment

<p><span>The arc of the Lesser Antilles is one of the most quiet subduction zone in the world. In this region, the convergence of the Atlantic and the Caribbean plates is low (</span><span>few </span><span>mm/year) and most of the seismicity is a</span><span>n</span><span> intraplate and crustal seismicity. Among the Mw>7 earthquakes recorded in the historical catalog (1690 near Barbuda, 1843 near Guadeloupe, 1867 near the Virgin Islands, 1839 offshore Martinica, 1969 offshore Dominica, 1974 near Antigua), only the 1839 and 1843 events are suspected to be interplate earthquakes. The 1867 Virgin Island earthquake generated an important tsunami with waves of 10m that devastated the closest islands. A tsunami followed the 1843 earthquake but without much damage. These two events are the only known damaging tsunami in this region, but another older one might be added to the list. Indeed, an increasing number of tsunami deposits have been identified in the recent years on several islands of the arc, all of them being around 500 years old (~1450 AD). These deposits are all located in the northern segment of the arc, between Antigua and Puerto-Rico, in Anegada, St-Thomas (Virgin Islands), Anguilla </span><span>and</span><span> Scrub islands. There is </span><span>unfortunately</span><span> no record and no testimonies of an extreme event at that time.</span></p><p><span>The northern segment of the arc is particularly complex because located at the transition </span><span>between</span><span> the Greater Antilles </span><span>and the Lesser Antilles</span><span>. </span><span>It</span><span> is crossed by the Anegada Passage, a series of faults and basins cutting through the arc, which defines the limit between the Puerto-Rico micro-plate and the Caribbean plate. This passage and the numerous intra-arc fault systems present between the islands are active and likely compensate for the plates motion. The very low slip deficit detected with GPS measurements at the subduction contacts of Puerto-Rico and the Lesser Antilles indicates that the interface from Guadeloupe to Puerto-Rico can be considered as totally uncoupled or holding the characteristics of a very long seismic cycle. A tsunami generated by an extreme event 500 years ago in this region could be related to </span><span>intra-arc, outer-rise,</span><span> intraplate </span><span>or</span><span> interface fault rupture. The identification of the source </span><span>would</span><span> enable a better understanding of the seismic cycle and the dynamic of this part of the arc.</span></p><p><span>This study lists </span><span>and set models of</span><span> all the potential faults that could trigger an earthquake in the area encompassing the three islands : Anguilla, Anegada and StThomas. </span><span>We have created high-resolution bathymetric grids and</span><span> performed tsunami simulations </span><span>for each fault model</span><span>. </span><span>W</span><span>e uses run-up models to compare the simulated wave heights </span><span>and run-up distance</span><span> to all the deposits heights </span><span>and positions</span><span>. The magnitudes of our fault models range between 7 and </span><span>9,</span><span> but very few of them generate a strong enough tsunami t</span><span>o</span> <span>match</span><span> the observ</span><span>ed deposits</span><span>.</span></p>

The Geology of the British Virgin Islands

1924 ◽  
Vol 61 (8) ◽  
pp. 339-351 ◽  
Author(s):  
K. W. Earle
Keyword(s):  
Dominican Republic ◽  
Volcanic Rocks ◽  
Virgin Islands ◽  
Geological Structure ◽  
Lesser Antilles ◽  
Greater Antilles ◽  
Igneous Intrusion ◽  
British Virgin Islands ◽  
The Caribbean ◽  
Granitoid Intrusions

The geological structure of the British Virgin Islands correlates them indisputably with the Greater and not with the Lesser Antilles. The latter are composed essentially of Tertiary volcanic rocks of andesitic or basaltic type, with or without development of sedimentary strata which, when present, only dip at gentle angles and never show the violent effects of such dynamic forces as have been responsible for the folding and “up-ending” of the strata in the Virgin Islands. The tremendous depth of the channel separating the British Virgin Islands from the Lesser Antilles lias been ascribed to faulting, probably initiated in Pliocene times.The work of Cleve (1), Hill (4), Vaughan (5), and others (6) in the American Virgin Islands, Porto Rico, the Dominican Republic, Cuba, Haiti, and Jamaica, indicates that the British Virgin Islands form geologically only the eastern termination of that main group of islands and have been subjected to the same earth movements as them. The evidence for attributing a Cretaceous age to the sedimentary series has already been referred to.With regard to the age of the folding and igneous intrusion, Vaughan considers that the folding took place between upper Eocene and middle Oligoccne times, and that the intrusion of the diorites took place at approximately the same date. (7)Wythe Cooke considers that the igneous basal complex in the Dominican Republic certainly dates from Cretaceous time, but that part is probably older. He also considers that the stresses that folded and sheared these rocks were probably active during Eocene time or earlier, and that the intrusion of the great masses of dioritic rocks probably occurred before the deposition of the Eocene sediments.According to Hill (4), however, “in mid-Tertiary times granitoid intrusions were pushed upward into the sediments of the Greater Antilles, the Caribbean, Costa Eican, and Panamic regions.” Frazer, on the other hand (8), considered the nuclear axis of Cuba and San Domingo, and possibly of all the Caribbean islands, to be Archaean, a view upheld also by Dr. W. Bergt. (9)There is no doubt that the key to these problems lies in the larger islands of the Greater Antilles, for it is only there that unaltered fossiliferous sediments occur and can be studied in relation to the igneous intrusion and metamorphism. There appears, however, to the writer to be nothing either in the geological or faunal evidence necessarily indicating previous land connexion at any time between the Virgin Islands and the Lesser Antilles, ahd on this matter it is hoped to furnish further evidence at a later date.

Paleomagnetic and structural study of the NEastern Caribbean plate as mean to give paleogeographic constrains for fauna dispersal.

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Leny Montheil ◽  
Douwe Van Hinsbergen ◽  
Philippe Münch ◽  
Pierre Camps ◽  
Mélody Philippon
Keyword(s):  
Puerto Rico ◽  
Plate Boundary ◽  
Vertical Axis ◽  
Plate Motion ◽  
Lesser Antilles ◽  
Caribbean Region ◽  
Greater Antilles ◽  
Caribbean Plate ◽  
The Bahamas ◽  
The Caribbean

<p>Since the Eocene, the northeastern corner of the Caribbean plate is shaped by the indentation of the buoyant Bahamas platform with the Greater Caribbean Arc, the suture of a portion of the Antillean subduction zone along Cuba and Hispaniola and the subsequent relocation of the plate boundary along the strike slip Cayman Trough. Puzzlingly enough, these major re-arrangements followed a plate motion reorganization (Boschmann et al., 2014). During this kinematic reorganization, the Lesser Antilles trench initiated (or subduction intensified) along the eastern boundary of the Caribbean plate and progressively bent, resulting in an increase of subduction obliquity from south to north (Philippon et al., 2020a). This curvature has been, and still may be, associated with deformation within the Caribbean plate. Interestingly, in the 10-15 Ma following the plate reorganization, a hypothetical, now submerged “landbridge” allowed the dispersion of terrestrial fauna from South America to the Greater Antilles: the GAARlandia landbridge (land of Greater Antilles and Aves Ridge). Although it has been recently shown that Puerto Rico and the Northern Lesser Antilles where connected once forming a land mass called GrANoLA around 33-35 Ma (Philippon et al., 2020b), these rapids and drastics geodynamical changes may have impacted the regional paleogeography, which remains to be constrained. The intraplate deformation in the north-est Caribbean region associated with the plate reorganization, the Bahamas indentation, and the plate boundary curvature likely hold the key to (part of) the evolution of this landbridge.<br>At present day, the N-Eastern border of the Caribbean plate shows parallel to the trench faults dissecting the plate in a sliver-like manner. This “sliver” is cross cutted by perpendicular to the trench faults in four crustal blocks: Gonave, Hispaniola, Puerto Rico and the Northern Lesser Antilles. Present-day and past kinematics of these blocks, and even their existence, are still debated.</p><p>In this study, in the course of the French GAARAnti project, we focus on paleomagnetically determined vertical axis rotations that affected Puerto Rico and the Northern Lesser Antilles blocks since the Eocene, and use these to inform kinematic reconstructions constrained by regional structural analysis and Ar<sup>40</sup>-Ar<sup>39</sup> geochronology. These reconstructions will be used to refine the paleogeographic evolution of the NEastern edge of the Caribbean plate since the Eocene in order test the GAARlandia hypothesis.</p><p>A new set of paleomagnetic data (180 Oligo-Miocene specimens of sediments sampled in 18 sites) indicates that the Puerto Rico block underwent an early to mid-Miocene 10° counterclockwise (CCW) rotation. This result clearly differs from those of Reid et al., 1991 who concluded a Late Miocene 25° CCW rotation and that is currently used by the community to interpret the tectonic history of the northeastern Caribbean plate. The use of a larger dataset, that geographically covers the entire island, and of a more recent reference frame explain the difference observed between the two results. This new result will lead to a re-interpretation of the tectonic evolution of the region that will be integrated in a regional kinematic reconstruction.</p>

Geology and hydrogeology of the Caribbean islands aquifer system of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands

2002 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert A. Renken ◽  
W. C. Ward ◽  
I.P. Gill ◽  
Fernando Gómez-Gómez ◽  
Jesús Rodríguez-Martínez ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Puerto Rico ◽  
Virgin Islands ◽  
Aquifer System ◽  
Caribbean Islands ◽  
The Caribbean ◽  
The U.S

scholarly journals Understanding the Urgent Need for Subtitling for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing in the Spanish-Speaking Greater Antilles

2020 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Adrián Fuentes-Luque ◽  
Pabsi Livmar González-Irizarry
Keyword(s):  
Puerto Rico ◽  
Dominican Republic ◽  
Hard Of Hearing ◽  
Greater Antilles ◽  
Social Barriers ◽  
Spanish Speaking ◽  
Current State ◽  
The World ◽  
Different Types ◽  
The Caribbean

Even though Audiovisual Translation (AVT) is growing and flourishing throughout the world, it is practically unheard-of in the Caribbean, where accessibility faces an even bleaker existence. The circumstances of the deaf and hard of hearing (also referred to as D/deaf) are no less alarming: social barriers and exclusion are widespread. This paper emphasizes the need to make subtitles accessible in the Spanish-speaking Caribbean, specifically on the islands of Puerto Rico, Cuba, and the Dominican Republic, and underscores the challenges faced by the D/deaf communities on each island. Our research focuses on issues like AVT laws and regulations, the habits of viewers of audiovisual (AV) products, and literacy and limitations on each island. This paper also examines the different types of D/deaf audiovisual consumers in the Spanish-speaking Caribbean and the difficulties each community faces when accessing media and entertainment. Our research reveals the current state of AVT accessibility in this region and provides a foundation for influencing legislators to begin enforcing AVT regulations and drafting SDH guidelines.

scholarly journals The earliest record of Caribbean frogs: a fossil coquí from Puerto Rico

2020 ◽  
Vol 16 (4) ◽  
pp. 20190947 ◽  
Author(s):  
David C. Blackburn ◽  
Rachel M. Keeffe ◽  
María C. Vallejo-Pareja ◽  
Jorge Vélez-Juarbe
Keyword(s):  
Puerto Rico ◽  
Direct Evidence ◽  
Indirect Evidence ◽  
Distal Humerus ◽  
Greater Antilles ◽  
Terrestrial Vertebrates ◽  
Early Arrival ◽  
The Caribbean ◽  
Molecular Phylogenies ◽  
Additional Support

The nearly 200 species of direct-developing frogs in the genus Eleutherodactylus (the Caribbean landfrogs, which include the coquís) comprise an important lineage for understanding the evolution and historical biogeography of the Caribbean. Time-calibrated molecular phylogenies provide indirect evidence for the processes that shaped the modern anuran fauna, but there is little direct evidence from the fossil record of Caribbean frogs about their distributions in the past. We report a distal humerus of a frog from the Oligocene (approx. 29 Ma) of Puerto Rico that represents the earliest known fossil frog from any Caribbean island. Based on its prominent rounded distal humeral head, distally projecting entepicondyle, and reduced ectepicondyle, we refer it to the genus Eleutherodactylus . This fossil provides additional support for an early arrival of some groups of terrestrial vertebrates to the Greater Antilles and corroborates previous estimates based on molecular phylogenies suggesting that this diverse Caribbean lineage was present in the islands by the mid-Cenozoic.

The Pre-Arawak Pottery Horizon in the Antilles: A New Approximation

2008 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
pp. 47-63 ◽  
Author(s):  
Reniel Rodríguez Ramos ◽  
Elvis Babilonia ◽  
L. Antonio Curet ◽  
Jorge Ulloa
Keyword(s):  
Puerto Rico ◽  
Lesser Antilles ◽  
Social Implications ◽  
Divergent Evolution ◽  
Greater Antilles ◽  
The Social ◽  
Early Ceramic ◽  
Early Pottery

Pottery in contexts that predate the entrance of Arawak societies to the Antilles (500 B.C.) by at least one millennium demand a reassessment of the introduction of this technology to the islands. We summarize the available evidence of what we term the Pre-Arawak Pottery horizon and address the social implications of the introduction of such technology to the insular Caribbean, based on the role of pots as tools. We show that this early pottery is more widespread than originally thought, extending from Cuba to Hispanola and perhaps to Puerto Rico and the Lesser Antilles as well. We argue that the paucity of early ceramic contexts discovered thus far could have resulted from the consideration of pottery as intrusive in Pre-Arawak contexts and because of its technological and stylistic overlap with wares associated to the Ostionoid series (A.D. 600-1500) of the Greater Antilles. Based on this evidence, we conclude by suggesting that some of the post-Saladoid manifestations that have been identified in the islands could have resulted from a multifocal development of these pre-Arawak cultures rather than simply from the divergent evolution of Saladoid societies as has been argued thus far.

scholarly journals Local Annual Survival and Seasonal Residency Rates of Semipalmated Sandpipers (Calidris Pusilla) in Puerto Rico

The Auk ◽  
2007 ◽  
Vol 124 (4) ◽  
pp. 1397-1406 ◽  
Author(s):  
Susan M. Rice ◽  
Jaime A. Collazo ◽  
Mathew W. Alldredge ◽  
Brian A. Harrington ◽  
Allen R. Lewis
Keyword(s):  
Puerto Rico ◽  
Length Of Stay ◽  
Differential Mortality ◽  
Caribbean Region ◽  
Greater Antilles ◽  
Annual Survival ◽  
Salt Flats ◽  
The Caribbean ◽  
Calidris Pusilla ◽  
Semipalmated Sandpipers

Abstract We report seasonal residency and local annual survival rates of migratory Semipalmated Sandpipers (Calidris pusilla) at the Cabo Rojo salt flats, Puerto Rico. Residency rate (daily probability of remaining on the flats) was 0.991 ± 0.001 (x̄ ± SE), yielding a mean length of stay of 110 days. This finding supports the inclusion of the Caribbean as part of the species' winter range. Average estimated percentage of fat was low but increased throughout the season, which suggests that birds replenish some spent fat reserves and strive for energetic maintenance. Local annual survival rate was 0.62 ± 0.04, within the range of values reported for breeding populations at Manitoba and Alaska (0.53–0.76). The similarity was not unexpected because estimates were obtained annually but at opposite sites of their annual migratory movements. Birds captured at the salt flats appeared to be a mix of birds from various parts of the breeding range, judging from morphology (culmen's coefficient of variation = 9.1, n = 106). This suggested that origin (breeding area) of birds and their proportion in the data should be ascertained and accounted for in analyses to glean the full conservation implications of winter-based annual survival estimates. Those data are needed to unravel the possibility that individuals of distinct populations are affected by differential mortality factors across different migratory routes. Mean length of stay strongly suggested that habitat quality at the salt flats was high. Rainfall and tidal flow combine to increase food availability during fall. The salt flats dry up gradually toward late January, at the onset of the dry season. Semipalmated Sandpipers may move west to other Greater Antilles or south to sites such as coastal Surinam until the onset of spring migration. They are not an oversummering species at the salt flats. Conservation efforts in the Caribbean region require understanding the dynamics of this species throughout winter to protect essential habitat. Tasas de Supervivencia Anual Local y de Residencia Estacional de Calidris pusilla en Puerto Rico

Caribbean Organization

1965 ◽  
Vol 19 (4) ◽  
pp. 1070-1073
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Puerto Rico ◽  
The Netherlands ◽  
French Guiana ◽  
The United States ◽  
Virgin Islands ◽  
British Virgin Islands ◽  
Netherlands Antilles ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
The Caribbean

The Caribbean Council held its fifth and last meeting in Curaçao, Netherlands Antilles, from November 30 to December 4, 1964. Attending the meeting were delegates from France on behalf of French Guiana, Guadeloupe, and Martinique; the Netherlands Antilles; Surinam; the British Virgin Islands; the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico; and the United States Virgin Islands. Representatives of Antigua, Barbados, Dominica, Grenada, Montserrat, and St. Vincent, countries enjoying special observer status, attended the meeting. Also at the meeting were observers from the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

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