Pillow lava flows: Isolated sacks or connected tubes?

Observations in the Montgenevre Massif (French-Italian Alps) and in several other pillow basalt localities indicate that most pillowy flows are not made up of isolated spheres or sacks. In sections more or less parallel to the surface of the flow, it can be seen that pillows are in fact part of a system of interconnected fingers or tubes of lava that divide and bifurcate in the direction of flow. In transverse sections however the pillows appear to be isolated because of geometrical reasons. If this pillow lava structure seems to be the general rule, it is nevertheless likely that in the case of very fluid lavas and on a steep slope, the end of a tube or a new bud may become detached and roll down the bank in front of the flow to form an isolated spheroid.     

浅谈芦山地震

地震序列是对地震现象的回顾性描述,只有在地震序列结束后它才有可能被确切无疑地判定.鉴于龙门山断裂带或地震带的整体性、统一性和系统性,不可否认在其西南段发生的芦山地震是与汶川地震一样的同属于龙门山断裂带的事件.鉴于芦山地震的震源位置、震源机制、震级大小和破裂区覆盖的范围,目前可认为它是汶川地震迄今最大的余震.鉴于地震序列的判定是对地震现象的唯象的描述,有相当的任意性,对芦山地震究竟是"新的主震"还是"汶川余震"的"讨论"实质上是在根据经验判定地震的类型,即使目前看"主震说"提出的4条"论据"明显缺乏说服力,"余震说"比较有说服力,但最后都需要等到地震序列结束之后才有可能"定论".作者认为,相对于需要等到地震序列结束之后才能"定论"、甚而在地震序列结束之后未必能"定论"的芦山地震究竟是"新的主震"还是"汶川余震"问题,应当更为关注芦山地震的发生引出的一些重要的亟待研究的科学问题与防震减灾问题.     

Evolution of an englacial volcanic ridge: Pillow Ridge tindar, Mount Edziza volcanic complex, NCVP, British Columbia, Canada

Glaciovolcanic deposits are critical for documenting the presence and thickness of terrestrial ice-sheets, and for testing hypotheses about inferred terrestrial ice volumes based on the marine record. Deposits formed by the coincidence of volcanism and ice at the Mount Edziza volcanic complex (MEVC) in northern British Columbia, Canada, preserve an important record for documenting local and possibly regional ice dynamics. Pillow Ridge, located at the northwestern end of the MEVC, formed by ice-confined, fissure-fed eruptions. It comprises predominantly pillow lavas and volcanic breccias of alkaline basalt composition, with subordinate finer-grained volcaniclastic deposits and dykes. The ridge is presently  4 km long,  1000 m in maximum width, and  600 m high. Fifteen syn- and post-eruptive lithofacies are recognized in excellent exposures along the glacially dissected western side of the ridge. We recognize five lithofacies associations: (1) poorly sorted tuff breccia and dykes, (2) proximal pillow lava, dykes and tuff breccia, (3) distal pillow lava, poorly sorted conglomerate and well-sorted volcanic sandstone, (4) interbedded tuff, lapilli tuff, and tuff breccia units, and (5) heterolithic volcanogenic conglomerate and sandstone. Given the abundance of pillow lavas and the lack of surrounding topographic barriers capable of impounding water, we agree with Souther [Souther, J.G., 1992. The late Cenozoic Mount Edziza volcanic complex. Geol. Soc. Can. Mem., vol. 420. 320 pp] that the bulk of the edifice formed while confined by ice, but have found evidence for a more complex and variable eruption history than that which he proposed. Preliminary estimates of water-ice depths derived from FTIR analyses of H₂O give ranges of 300 to 680 m assuming 0 ppm CO₂, and 857 to 1297 m assuming 25 ppm CO₂. Variations in depth estimates among samples may indicate that water/ice depths changed during the evolution of the ridge, which is consistent with our interpretations for the origins of different lithofacies associations. Given that the age of the units are likely to be ca. 0.9 Ma [Souther, J.G., 1992. The late Cenozoic Mount Edziza volcanic complex. Geol. Soc. Can. Mem., vol. 420. 320 pp], Pillow Ridge may be the best documentation of a regional high stand of the Cordilleran Ice Sheet (CIS) in the middle Pleistocene, and an excellent example of the lithofacies and stratigraphic complexities produced by variations in water levels during a prolonged glaciovolcanic eruption.