EAGER: Bubble Plume Emissions from Fault Zones within the Puget Sound Forearc

University Of Washington, Seattle WA

Investigators

Abstract

This EAGER proposal will obtain samples from newly identified gas and fluid plumes in Puget Sound to determine whether the plumes come from the Cascadia subduction zone megathrust. The idea is that deep regional faults act as pathways for upward migration of fluid that has been generated by heating along the plate interface between the North America and the incoming Juan de Fuca Plate. If the Puget Sound plumes have a subduction zone source, the plumes may provide a means to monitor the pressure and chemistry of the fluid between the plates, and provide a new approach for studying slip on the Cascadia subduction zone megathrust fault. This project is a first step toward developing predictive models for understanding seismic hazards in the heavily-populated Pacific Northwest. Upward migration of fluid and gas through the forearc crust that overlies active subduction zone faults has been observed in settings very similar to the Puget Sound region, including Japan Trench on the Kii peninsula, New Zealand at the Hikurangi margin, and on the Baja California Peninsula, Mexico. Although these fluid seeps emit fluid with helium, oxygen, hydrogen isotope signatures that unambiguously identify them as coming from the subduction zone fault, none of them emit fluid and gas with the vigor or wide spatial distribution observed within Puget Sound. Critically, none of the previous globally-identified forearc plumes are in subduction zones where periodic Episodic Tremor and Slip (ETS) events occur - that arise from periodic local slippage on the subduction zone fault. At Cascadia, these ETS events have a quasi-period of 14 months and variations in the amplitude and intervals are newly-recognized as potential precursors to both regional faulting and large episodic megathrust earthquakes. If the the new Puget plumes are found to be derived from the subduction zone megathrust zone, it would be the first step in using correlations between the variations in emissions and ETS behavior to understand slip on the megathrust. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.