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Broad accommodation of rift-related extension recorded by dyke intrusion in Saudi Arabia

Nature Geoscience volume 3, pages 705–712 (2010)Cite this article

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Abstract

The extensive harrat lava province of Arabia formed during the past 30 million years in response to Red Sea rifting and mantle upwelling. The area was regarded as seismically quiet, but between April and June 2009 a swarm of more than 30,000 earthquakes struck one of the lava fields in the province, Harrat Lunayyir, northwest Saudi Arabia. Concerned that larger damaging earthquakes might occur, the Saudi Arabian government evacuated 40,000 people from the region. Here we use geologic, geodetic and seismic data to show that the earthquake swarm resulted from magmatic dyke intrusion. We document a surface fault rupture that is 8 km long with 91 cm of offset. Surface deformation is best modelled by the shallow intrusion of a north-west trending dyke that is about 10 km long. Seismic waves generated during the earthquakes exhibit overlapping very low- and high-frequency components. We interpret the low frequencies to represent intrusion of magma and the high frequencies to represent fracturing of the crystalline basement rocks. Rather than extension being accommodated entirely by the central Red Sea rift axis, we suggest that the broad deformation observed in Harrat Lunayyir indicates that rift margins can remain as active sites of extension throughout rifting. Our analyses allowed us to forecast the likelihood of a future eruption or large earthquake in the region and informed the decisions made by the Saudi Arabian government to return the evacuees.

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Figure 1: Index map, showing the 180,000 km2 harrat lava fields (black) within Saudi Arabia.
Figure 2: Digital helicorder records for 19 May 2009 from seismic station LNYS (located ∼15 km SE of the fault rupture).
Figure 3: Ten-minute real-time seismic amplitude (RSAM) plots showing peak seismic energy release for the vertical component of broadband seismic stations UMJS and LNYS (45 km WSW and 29 km SE from the epicentre of the M5.4 earthquake).
Figure 4: Photographs showing the surface rupture produced by the 19 May 2009 earthquake.
Figure 5: Images showing seismic and deformation data from 2009 activity at Harrat Lunayyir.
Figure 6: Oblique aerial photograph showing basalt cinder cones and lava in northern Harrat Lunayyir.

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Acknowledgements

This work is the result of a joint effort of the Saudi Arabian Geological Survey (SGS), and the US Geological Survey (USGS), conducted with the assistance of the US Consulate, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. We thank many SGS colleagues (too numerous to list individually here) who participated in field and laboratory work and contributed to the success of the crisis response. We also acknowledge support to the Volcano Disaster Assistance Program provided by USAID’s Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance and the USGS Volcano Hazards Program, and we thank SGS President Z. Nawab for facilitating our work together. Original Envisat radar raw data are copyrighted by the European Space Agency (ESA) and were provided by ESA. We also acknowledge the Nature Geoscience reviewers and editor Whitchurch, whose contributions substantially improved this paper.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Volcano Disaster Assistance Program, U.S. Geological Survey, Cascades Volcano Observatory, 1300 SE Cardinal Court, Vancouver, Washington 98683, USA

    John S. Pallister, Wendy A. McCausland, Zhong Lu & Randal A. White

  2. King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST), Thuwal 23955, Saudi Arabia

    Sigurjón Jónsson

  3. Saudi Geological Survey, National Center for Earthquakes and Volcanoes, P.O. Box 54141, Jeddah 21514, Saudi Arabia

    Hani M. Zahran, Salah El Hadidy, Abdallah Aburukbah & Ian C. F. Stewart

  4. Jet Propulsion Laboratory, M/S 300-233, 4800 Oak Grove Drive, Pasadena, California 91109, USA

    Paul R. Lundgren

  5. Faculty of Earth Sciences, King Abdul Aziz University, P.O. Box 80206, Jeddah 21589, Saudi Arabia

    Mohammed R. H. Moufti

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  1. John S. Pallister
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Contributions

H.M.Z. organized the overall crisis response and coordinated the results with government officials. S.E.H. contributed earthquake focal solutions and seismic data. A.A. provided computer programming and seismic network data support. I.C.F.S. contributed to the geophysics and field geology, seismic location interpretations, and overall communication between the groups. W.A.M. analysed and interpreted all of the continuous seismic data. Z.L. processed and interpreted Envisat data, S.J. modelled and interpreted the radar data, P.R.L. processed and interpreted Terra-SAR-X data, J.S.P. conducted field work, contributed to volcanic hazards analysis and with assistance from W.A.M. and S.J., wrote the paper. R.A.W. summarized data on comparable seismic swarms and magnitudes from other volcanic fields for use in forecasting. M.R.H.M. contributed volcanologic data and context based on his extensive field work on the harrat fields of Saudi Arabia.

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Correspondence to John S. Pallister.

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Pallister, J., McCausland, W., Jónsson, S. et al. Broad accommodation of rift-related extension recorded by dyke intrusion in Saudi Arabia. Nature Geosci 3, 705–712 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1038/ngeo966

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