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A transform fault or transform boundary, is a fault along a plate boundary where the motion is predominantly horizontal. [1] It ends abruptly where it connects to another plate boundary, either another transform, a spreading ridge, or a subduction zone. [2] A transform fault is a special case of a strike-slip fault that also forms a plate boundary.
The Motagua Fault, which crosses through Guatemala, is a transform boundary between the southern edge of the North American plate and the northern edge of the Caribbean plate. New Zealand's Alpine Fault is another active transform boundary. The Dead Sea Transform (DST) fault which runs through the Jordan River Valley in the Middle East.
Magmatism along strike-slip faults is the process of rock melting, magma ascent and emplacement, associated with the tectonics and geometry of various strike-slip settings, most commonly occurring along transform boundaries at mid-ocean ridge spreading centres [1] and at strike-slip systems parallel to oblique subduction zones. [2]
Where the plates meet, their relative motion determines the type of plate boundary (or fault): convergent, divergent, or transform. The relative movement of the plates typically ranges from zero to 10 cm annually. Faults tend to be geologically active, experiencing earthquakes, volcanic activity, mountain-building, and oceanic trench formation.
An interplate earthquake event occurs when the accumulated stress at a tectonic plate boundary are released via brittle failure and displacement along the fault. There are three types of plate boundaries to consider in the context of interplate earthquake events: [4] Transform fault: Where two boundaries slide laterally relative to each other.
When these are drawn onto the diagram containing the velocity triangle these lines must be able to meet at a single point, for the triple junction to exist stably. These lines necessarily are parallel to the plate boundaries as to remain on the plate boundaries the observer must either move along the plate boundary or remain stationary on it.
As the plates on either side of an offset mid-ocean ridge move, a transform fault forms at the offset between the two ridges. [2] Fracture zones and the transform faults that form them are separate but related features. Transform faults are plate boundaries, meaning that on either side of the fault is a different plate.
The northern boundary with the North American plate is a transform or strike-slip boundary that runs from the border area of Belize, Guatemala (Motagua Fault), and Honduras in Central America, eastward through the Cayman trough along the Swan Islands Transform Fault before joining the southern boundary of the Gonâve microplate.