Lavini di Marco (Trentino,Italy): 36Cl exposure dating of a polyphase rock avalanche

The Lavini di Marco rock avalanche deposit (“Marocca di Marco”) is located along the left side of the middle Adige Valley, south of the town of Rovereto (NE Italy). The deposit is estimated to have a volume of ～2 × 10⁸ m³ and cover an area of ～6.8 km². It comprises Jurassic Calcari Grigi limestones that detached from the western slope of Mt. Zugna Torta. The Lavini di Marco is composed of at least two different rock avalanche bodies, the main deposit known as Lavini di Marco (the principal) and the much smaller Costa Stenda deposit. Costa Stenda deposits overlie Lavini di Marco deposits. Samples for ³⁶Cl exposure dating were collected from boulders within the deposits, from sliding plane bedrock and from the bedrock wall at the head scarp. Exposure ages range from 800 ± 210 to 21310 ± 1000 years. The latter age stands as a notable outlier suggesting that that Costa Stenda boulder was exposed for a considerable amount of time in the pre-slide bedrock. Lavini di Marco and Costa Stenda boulder ages are 2600 ± 200, 2700 ± 200, 3100 ± 300, 3300 ± 300, 3400 ± 300, 4400 ± 290, 5300 ± 300, and 5400 ± 300 years. The latter three are Costa Stenda boulders which we also interpret to contain inherited nuclide concentrations. The five remaining boulder ages cluster around 3000 years. We calculate a mean age for the Lavini di Marco and Costa Stenda rockslides of 3000 ± 400 years. Within the uncertainties of our data the two slides were simultaneous. For the bedrock sliding plane we obtained significantly younger ages, 1600 ± 100 and 1400 ± 100 years, and for the head scarp 800 ± 200 years. The sliding plane ages record small-scale reactivation which seems to overlap in time with a catastrophic flood event of the Adige River in Verona, as reported in the Fulda Annales, in 883 AD. Only the single age of 800 ± 210 years suggests activity at Lavini di Marco coincident with the well-known Verona earthquake (1117 AD).