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Quaternary deformation in the northern Chile forearc is controlled by trench parallel shortening along reactivated Mesozoic faults. Dextral strikes-slip is expressed in NW–SE striking faults of the Atacama Fault System, and reverse displacement dominates in E–W faults. This deformation results of the convergence in a concave-seaward continental margin. On September 11th, 2020, a Mw 6.3 earthquake and its subsequent aftershocks took place in the coastal region of northern Chile, revealing the reactivation of the deepest segment of a WNW–ESE striking upper plate fault. The reactivation of this fault occurred after the Mw 8.1 Iquique earthquake, and it seems to be connected to a N–S interplate locking segmentation of the plate margin, which is clearly shown by the locking pattern before the Iquique earthquake. This poses the question of how heterogeneous locking influences upper plate seismicity and how it relates to trench-parallel shortening. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Northern Chilean subduction zone is characterized by long-term subduction erosion with very little sediment input at the trench and the lack of an accretionary prism. Here, multichannel seismic reflection (MCS) data were acquired as part of the CINCA (Crustal Investigations off- and onshore Nazca Plate/Central Andes) project in 1995. These lines cover among others the central part of the M W 8.1 Iquique earthquake rupture zone before the earthquake occurred on 1 April 2014. We have re-processed one of the lines crossing the updip parts of this earthquake at 19°40′S, close to its hypocentre. After careful data processing and data enhancement, we applied a coherency-based pre-stack depth migration algorithm, yielding a detailed depth image. The resulting depth image shows the subduction interface prior to the Iquique megathrust earthquake down to a depth of approximately 16 km and gives detailed insight into the characteristics of the seismogenic coupling zone. We found significantly varying interplate reflectivity along the plate interface which we interpret to be caused by the comparably strong reflectivity of subducted fluid-rich sediments within the grabens and half-grabens that are predominant in this area due to the subduction-related bending of the oceanic plate. No evidence was found for a subducted seamount associated to the Iquique Ridge along the slab interface at this latitude as interpreted earlier from the same data set. By comparing relocated fore- and aftershock seismicity of the Iquique earthquake with the resulting depth image, we can divide the continental wedge into two domains. First, a frontal unit beneath the lower slope with several eastward dipping back-rotated splay faults but no seismicity in the upper plate as well as along the plate interface. Secondly, a landward unit beneath the middle slope with differing reflectivity that shows significant seismicity in the upper plate as well as along the plate interface. Both units are separated by a large eastward dipping mega splay fault, the root zone of which shows diffuse seismicity, both in the upper plate and at the interface. The identification of a well-defined nearly aseismic frontal unit sheds new light on the interplate locking beneath the lower continental slope and its controls. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study presents a new geomorphological approach to investigate the past activity and potential seismic hazard of upper crustal faults at the Salar del Carmen segment of the Atacama Fault System in the northern Chile forearc. Our contribution is based on the analysis of a large set of topographic profiles and allows extrapolating fault analysis from a few selected locations to distances of kilometers along strike of the fault. We detected subtle changes in the fault scarp geometry which may represent the number of paleoearthquakes experienced by the structure and extracted the cumulative and last incremental displacement along strike of the investigated scarps. We also tested the potential of knickpoints in channels crossing the fault scarps as markers for repeated fault rupture and proxies for seismic displacement. The number of paleoearthquakes derived from our analysis is 2-3, well in agreement with recent paleoseismological investigations, which suggest 2-3 earthquakes ( Mw = 6.5-6.7) at the studied segments. Knickpoints record the number of events for about 55% of the analyzed profile pairs. Only few knickpoints represent the full seismic displacement, while most retain only a fraction of the displacement. The along-strike displacement distributions suggest fault growth from the center toward the tips and linkage of individual ruptures. Our approach also improves the estimation of paleomagnitudes in case of multiple fault rupture by allowing to quantify the last increment of displacement separately. Paleomagnitudes calculated from total segment length and the last increment of displacement ( Mw = 6.5-7.1) are in agreement with paleoseismological results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

On 1 April 2014, Northern Chile was struck by a magnitude 8.1 earthquake following a protracted series of foreshocks. The Integrated Plate Boundary Observatory Chile monitored the entire sequence of events, providing unprecedented resolution of the build-up to the main event and its rupture evolution. Here we show that the Iquique earthquake broke a central fraction of the so-called northern Chile seismic gap, the last major segment of the South American plate boundary that had not ruptured in the past century. Since July 2013 three seismic clusters, each lasting a few weeks, hit this part of the plate boundary with earthquakes of increasing peak magnitudes. Starting with the second cluster, geodetic observations show surface displacements that can be associated with slip on the plate interface. These seismic clusters and their slip transients occupied a part of the plate interface that was transitional between a fully locked and a creeping portion. Leading up to this earthquake, the b value of the foreshocks gradually decreased during the years before the earthquake, reversing its trend a few days before the Iquique earthquake. The mainshock finally nucleated at the northern end of the foreshock area, which skirted a locked patch, and ruptured mainly downdip towards higher locking. Peak slip was attained immediately downdip of the foreshock region and at the margin of the locked patch. We conclude that gradual weakening of the central part of the seismic gap accentuated by the foreshock activity in a zone of intermediate seismic coupling was instrumental in causing final failure, distinguishing the Iquique earthquake from most great earthquakes. Finally, only one-third of the gap was broken and the remaining locked segments now pose a significant, increased seismic hazard with the potential to host an earthquake with a magnitude of >8.5. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We present a quantitative reconstruction of uplift of the western flank of the Altiplano plateau (central Andes), one of the largest monoclines on the Earth, on the basis of an analysis of tectonic structures, syntectonic deposits, and geophysical data. Uplift occurred on a west vergent, slowly propagating system of high-angle reverse faults merging into a joint detachment that ramps down to midcrustal levels below the plateau edge. The upper ramps determine local fold geometries while the lower ramp controls large-scale surface tilting and uplift. At 20°S, this fault system was active between ∼30 Ma and 5-10 Ma, with maximum shortening rates of 0.22 mm/yr between 17 and 10 Ma. It generated some 2600 m of surface uplift with only minor shortening of ∼3000 m. Its activity was largely synchronous to eruption of large-volume ignimbrites from a midcrustal source. Geophysical data indicate that the fault system localized deformation at the boundary between a cool, strong forearc crust and a presumably fluid-rich and/or partially molten zone underneath the plateau area. The systematic relation between crustal melting and shortening with uplift at the western plateau margin can be traced along most of the plateau flank, with a stepwise decrease in age of deformation and magmatism toward the south indicating discontinuous addition of plateau segments. Crustal thickening to as much as 70 km from westward underthrusting in the back arc parts of the plateau isostatically compensated the tectonic surface uplift and monocline formation with respect to a stable forearc, which only reacted with minor tilting. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Coppenbrügge subaqueous ice-contact fan complex of early Saalian age is about 10 km long and up to 10 km wide and is composed of offset-stacked fan clinothems that are transgressive-regressive sequences formed during an overall lake level rise. The individual fan bodies consist of coarse gravel in the ice-proximal part, passing distally into sandy facies and showing large-scale foreset bedding. The iceberg scour recognized in an open-pit outcrop is up to 1.5 m deep, up to 2 m wide and cut in undisturbed mid-fan deposits. The scour-fill can be traced laterally for about 15 m and consists of sheared sand and, in the frontal zone, of downbent overlying strata surrounded by a zone of deformed sediments. The deformed sediment produced by the iceberg keel's shearing of the trough walls is a sand mass containing angular soft-sediment clasts that show internal folds and fractures. The basal surface of the deformed sediment is a nearly horizontal shear plane, steepening up laterally as a discrete thrust and showing a flat-ramp-flat geometry. The scour was formed by the iceberg keel's ploughing the substrate and pushing the sediment sideways and frontally, forming a ridge of deformed sediments at the trough end. This ridge was concurrently eroded by an accompanying meltwater underflow which apparently developed a horseshoe system of scouring vortices around the grounded iceberg. The current's scour was filled with massive, nonstratified sand deposited rapidly from turbulent suspension. The iceberg eventually broke up and its keel part was buried. As these ice fragments gradually melted, the space was closed by normal faulting and downbending of overlying strata. The collapsing scour-fill became partly liquified, and the resulting water-escape structures cut the normal faults and the overlying deposits. Though produced chiefly by tangential shear strain, iceberg-ploughing features are readily distinguishable from other glaciotectonic deformations. They can serve... [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]