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The plate formed because the triple junction had converted to an unstable form surrounded on all sides by transform faults, due to the development of a kink in one of the plate boundaries. The "Pacific Triangle", the oldest part of the Pacific plate, created during the initial stages of plate formation, is located just east of the Mariana ...
The Pacific Plate began forming when the triple junction at the center of Panthalassa destabilized about 190 million years ago. Panthalassa , also known as the Panthalassic Ocean or Panthalassan Ocean (from Greek πᾶν "all" and θάλασσα "sea"), [ 1 ] was the vast superocean that encompassed planet Earth and surrounded the ...
Relative velocity vectors of Pacific, Farallon, and Kula plates 55 million years ago (Black represents present-day land area). The Pacific-Farallon Ridge was a spreading ridge during the Late Cretaceous that extended 10,000 km in length and separated the Pacific Plate to the west and the Farallon Plate to the east.
This plate probably broke off the Farallon plate and, when subduction in the North Pacific shifted from Siberia to the Aleutian Trench c. 50 Ma, spreading ceased between the Kula plate and the Pacific plate. [8] The Pacific plate kept growing and lineations south of the Pacific Triangle indicate the Pacific–Phoenix ridge remained a simple N ...
The Mendocino triple junction is located at the eastern end of the Mendocino Fracture Zone where it approaches Cape Mendocino. The Mendocino triple junction (MTJ) is the point where the Gorda plate, the North American plate, and the Pacific plate meet, in the Pacific Ocean near Cape Mendocino in northern California.
The Tonga plate begins 2,500 km (1,600 mi) NNE of New Zealand and stretches northward, [4] until the plate ends bounded by the Niuafo'ou plate to the northwest and the Pacific plate to the northeast. The Hikurangi Margin is the extension of the Kermadec–Tonga subduction zone further south down the east coast of the North Island.
Relief map with the East Pacific Rise (shown in light blue), extending south from the Gulf of California. The East Pacific Rise (EPR) is a mid-ocean rise (usually termed an oceanic rise and not a mid-ocean ridge due to its higher rate of spreading that results in less elevation increase and more regular terrain), at a divergent tectonic plate boundary, located along the floor of the Pacific Ocean.
The Hikurangi Plateau is an oceanic plateau on the Pacific Plate that attached to the Chatham Ridge after being partially subducted under it, and is now subducting under the North Island. It likely formed in one of the world's largest volcanic outpourings, the greater Ontong Java event .