Do New Zealand’s active faults and volcanoes talk to each other?

This year’s Geoscience Tour lecture will review 25 years of trenching active faults in volcanic environments and how a scientist perspective on tectonics close of volcanoes changed through that time, from the simple utilisation of volcanic stratigraphy as timelines for paleo- earthquake history to a realisation that volcanic and tectonic processes are so intimately connected that one cannot be understood without the other. 

Pilar will show paleoseismic evidence based on criteria that she developed to distinguish types of earthquakes–eruption associations. Paleoseismic data, combined with geomorphology, borehole data, and geophysics, revealed strong temporal links between fault ruptures and volcanic eruptions. She will also draw on worldwide historic examples and stress modelling to infer possible crustal processes that can explain these time associations. Collectively, these studies improve our understanding of how volcanic eruptions and unrest are linked to active faults and earthquakes in the TVZ.