Vietnam5

East Japan Offshore

Kuril Oceanic Trench

As illustrated above, the Kuril oceanic trench is a deep submarine depression located in the western Pacific Ocean, between the Japan and Kamchatka trenches, seaward of the Kuril Islands and Hokkaido island (Japan), which marks the convergence an the collision of the Pacific lithospheric plate with Eurasian plate. The B-type subduction zone is, clearly recognized, as well as the shortened accretionary prism of the overriding plate (Eurasian plate), which is covered by a recent forearc basin, that is to say, by sedimentary basin located between the oceanic trench and the associated volcanic arc (placed westward of this Canvas autotrace), which is, also, recognized on next plates.

On the upper continental slope, a normal fault, looking NW, is, easily, recognized on this Canvas autotrace, as well as, a listric fault looking SE. Although the lower limit of the forearc basin sediments overlying the accretionary wedge is speculative, the age of the forearc sediments is, mainly, Pliocene and Quaternary.