Structural evolution of the Latakia Ridge and Cyprus Basin at the front of the Cyprus Arc, Eastern Mediterranean Sea

Abstract

The active deformation front between the African and Anatolian Plates in the eastern Mediterranean is delineated by the Cyprus Arc. Present plate kinematic vectors and earthquake data suggest that the movement along the eastern extent of the Cyprus Arc is largely sinistral strike–slip. It is, however, widely accepted that subduction took place beneath Cyprus until the early Miocene. Subduction has since thought to have become impeded by the collision of the Eratosthenes Seamount with the Island of Cyprus. The deformation front of the Cyprus Arc is dominated by the Latakia Ridge, a steep narrow high, which merges gradually with the lower slope of the broad Hecataeus Rise in the west and extends to the northern Levantine coast in the east where the expression of the ridge changes to a number of narrow, northeast-trending ridges and basins. The Latakia Ridge has previously been interpreted as either a thrust culmination or a positive flower structure. This study uses high-resolution marine seismic reflection profiles to delineate the stratigraphic and structural architecture of the deformation front. From seismic profiles, four stratigraphic units bounded by major basin-wide unconformities can be identified. These units are Eocene–lower Miocene, Miocene, uppermost Miocene (Messinian), and Pliocene–Quaternary. The timing of deformation determined from growth stratal architectures on the flanks of the major structures show that two main phases of deformation characterize the structural history of the deformation front. Each of these phases represents a different kinematic regime: a compressional regime dominated during the Miocene, whereas a strike–slip regime dominated in the Pliocene–Quaternary.