NRP - Admiral Gago Coutinho - Bank of the Giant

The NRP "Admiral Gago Coutinho" continues to map the seabeds of the seas of the Azores and reveals extraordinary images of the seabed, in this case the Bank of the Giant.

The Giant Submarine Mount is inserted in the Atlantic Middle Crest, a mountain range in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean with NE-SW general orientation and that makes the separation between the tectonic plate from America to the west with the Euro-Asian plates and the African one to the east.

The Atlantic Middle crest results from the extrusion of basaltic Vulcanism in this ocean zone which as it is expelled pushes the American plate west and the Euro-Asian and African plates east. The crest is therefore a high area relative to the surrounding seabeds, consisting of a series of volcanic buildings with overall NE-SW orientation and WNW-ESSE oriented buildings resulting from the extrusion of Vulcanism along transforming faults (perpendicular to the general orientation of the crest).

One of the figures shows two volcanic buildings now separated from 11 km that were implanted along NE-SW tectonic structures. Considering the average distance between the American plate and the Euro-Asian and African plates (about 20 mm/year) it can be estimated that the original volcanic structure separated about 550,000 years ago.