[Rockhounds] Sleeping subduction zone could awaken and form a new 'Ring of Fire' that swallows the Atlantic Ocean

[Kreigh Tomaszewski]

A subduction zone below the Gibraltar Strait is creeping westward and could
one day "invade" the Atlantic Ocean, causing the ocean to slowly close up,
new research suggests.

The *subduction zone*
<https://www.livescience.com/43220-subduction-zone-definition.html>, also
known as the Gibraltar arc or trench, currently sits in a narrow ocean
corridor between Portugal and Morocco. Its westward migration began around
30 million years ago, when a subduction zone formed along the northern
coast of what is now the Mediterranean Sea, but it has stalled in the last
5 million years, prompting some scientists to question whether the
Gibraltar arc is still active today.

It appears, however, that the arc is merely in a period of quiet, according
to a study published Feb. 13 in the journal *Geology*
<https://doi.org/10.1130/G51654.1>. This lull will likely last for another
20 million years, after which the Gibraltar arc could resume its advance
and break into the Atlantic in a process known as "subduction invasion."

The Atlantic Ocean hosts two subduction zones that researchers know of —
the Lesser Antilles subduction zone in the Caribbean and the Scotia arc,
near Antarctica.

"These subduction zones invaded the Atlantic several million years ago,"
lead author *João Duarte* <https://idl.ciencias.ulisboa.pt/joao-c-duarte>,
a geologist and assistant professor at the University of Lisbon, said in a
*statement*
<https://phys.org/news/2024-02-gibraltar-subduction-zone-invading-atlantic.html>.
"Studying Gibraltar is an invaluable opportunity because it allows
observing the process in its early stages when it is just happening."

https://www.livescience.com/planet-earth/rivers-oceans/sleeping-subduction-zone-could-awaken-and-form-a-new-ring-of-fire-that-swallows-the-atlantic-ocean