Transform Faults and Earth Movements

ABSTRACT
Contents will change as I continue to analyze the data from Goggle Earth and National Geographic Maps- I am proceeding, finding new Clues to add to that shown in first-read analyses (top texts are older than ones down-the-page). THE INFORMATION SHOWN BELOW IS MOSTLY A PARROTING OF GEOLOGICAL ASSERTIONS, AND I HAVE HAD TO DISCARD MUCH OF IT. I HAVE PUT IN BOLD NOTES THOSE FEATURES TAKEN FROM THE LITERATURE, WHICH HAVE BEEN FOUND TO INCORRECT. LATER BLOGS CONTAIN MORE CORRECT ANALYSES, AND I MUST EMPHASIZE THAT THIS WHOLE INVESTIGATION IS TRENDING TOWARD MORE ABSOLUTE TRUTH. IT IS DIFFICULT TO REACH A FINAL CONCLUSION, WHEN YOU HAVE TO CONTINUALLY DISCARD FEATURES WHICH HAVE BEEN STATED BY ASSERTION (BASED ON SPECULATION) LONG ENOUGH TO BE COMMONLY ACCEPTED.
Transform Faults and their relation to Equatorial Bulge, LOD, and Slowing of the Earth’s Spin
Transforms form lateral shear linears along Latitude lines within the Equatorial Bulge

in Ocean Basins- evidently due to shrinkage of the Bulge as the Earth decelerates, relative to non-bulge latitudes.
Shear lines form Grids almost parallel to the present Equator, so long as the Polar Axis does not wander significantly. The last major re-orientation of the polar axis, of 10-20 degrees from present north, occurred at the end of the Paleozoic (according to the geographical ocean basin map). This happened when a re-distribution of mass transpired (due to a thickening of the Crust as the Mantle shrunk with Vulcanism, among other reasons). I speculate that the older pole existed near Chukchi Plateau- 18 degrees from the present Pole.
Absence of transform grids occurs where there is no Bulge or where they are obliterated by subsequent events (such as with turbidites or erosion by currents). Both North Pacific and South Atlantic Oceans indicate that no axial wandering has occurred in the last 60 million years. The last rotation of the Crust is noticed by the angle between South America and the present Mid-Atlantic spreading linear. The bulge continues to shrink, as the Length of Day increases (the Moon becomes more distant and centrifugal force of the spinning Earth decreases). The absence of effects due to Bulge shifts or reductions does NOT indicate that the Bulge did not occur all around the Earth, but that my analysis finds only changes occurring within the Bulge.
Shear is most massive (of widest extent) along the Equator between Africa and South America and it creates an areal shifting of the bulge most noticeably from the South Pacific to the Marianas Trench.
Dating of above events could be improved by Rock Property measurement on islands. Continents do not show the above results, since they appear to display grids at angles differing from those found in ocean basins.




Dark lines on the map are linears (my term), which indicate anomalous behavior on the earth's surface- tne E-W line below Indonesia is a subduction zone, while the N-S line to the west is a ridge (90 E Longitude) left when India tracked toward its present position- a trail of interference with the CRUST made by the north-moving subcontinent in mid-Tertiary time.

More familiar are subduction and trenches made in the N. Hemisphere, notably Phillipines above and Hawaii below. Again, dark lines found by acoustic sounding are those representing movement now or in the last few million years.

The Hiwaiian Chain is an example of a linear array of islands which continue to form to the SE, grow by volcanic flows, settle, rift, and sink as they are progress through geologic time

The trace of active movement of portions of the earth's CRUST can be seen as a halo on the map (from acoustic sounding, by Wikipedia diagram) of vulcanism, thermal vents on the ocean floor, or seafloor spreading. We will be investigating the ANOMALOUS ZONE noticed to the north and east of Australia- which might be related to shrinkage or lateral movement of the Equatorial Bulge as the Earth slows.

Transforms are easily seen on a chart made by acoustic and geographic mapping, as dark lines- usually straight when normally progressing or curved whenever there are at least 2 factors impinging on each other.


The World Map results from movements of many segments of the CRUST- Colliding, shearing against each other, or sliding under or over neighbors.

Crustal Movement Indications noted on Pacific Ocean Maps

The Pacific Ocean is the largest and the eastern portion of it is the most island-free of all the Earth’s major bodies of water.
Further, it has a thin crust below it, compared to continental masses, and exhibits both subduction of that crust below North and South America, as well as separation from those continents by spreading zones and shear along both NW-SE and N-S directions. It has been well-mapped and has many features which impinge upon an understanding of how it moved through space and time.

The Eastern Pacific Basin shows many clues, as to its incipience.

Pacific Basin Map yields clues about relative Crustal Movements Referencing the Geographical Maps above, there are many clues for forming conjectures about how the largest basin has rearranged itself through time and space. A study of the maps shows that the following features may be used to identify Time and Spatial changes:
1. Slices in the basin floor are called Transform Faults (near-linear grooves on the ocean bottom), and they represent discontinuities in the seafloor- one side being moved left or right relative to the neighboring segment. These adjoining segments have been measured for age, and it is generally found that an active portion is younger in rock age than its neighbor. When one stands on land, as in California, and the segment across the fault is moving rightward relative to your position, this is named a Right-Lateral Fault. This is observed by finding moving fence posts or gullies (which have been displaced through time); the discontinuity is often sharp or has occurred within a small distance, such as a few feet. Discontinuities in the ocean floor are found mainly by geophysics, such as with acoustic sounding or from fractures at the land boundary (coast). I have observed that these fractures trend mainly NW-SE along California’s coast, as contrasted to the almost E-W transform faults in the ocean floor.
2. Eastern Pacific Transforms near CA tend to occur along latitude lines. This is not quite correct, and it may be surmised that the deviation is due to the wobbling of the earth or to Wandering of the Earth’s Poles causing trends which were previously aligned along latitude line to deviate as the earth re-orients with time (within a year of studying these cases, I have found that the Equatorial Bulge, EB, is of smaller latitudinal SPAN than for continents). I predict that the orientation along latitude lines is due to shearing of lower latitude mass against higher latitude crust as the Earth slows (more than 20 seconds per rotation, each million years; at 1000mph, for the equator, this amounts to 7 miles/million years and if sheared against the latitudes greater than 45 degrees would cause westward movement of 350 miles in the 50 million since the equatorial bulge has been slowing, relative to large latitudes). The mass nearer the equator would be spinning more rapidly (in terms of distance, not angular rotation) than that more to the north, and it would slow more noticeably as time goes by. This would cause shearing of the lower latitudes from the higher, and cause transform faulting to be initiated by the more obvious slowing at the equator. This can be due to the Moon’s pull on the portion facing it, creating a sort of friction for the Earth as it moves across the moon’s gravitational field. This would create left lateral movement in the north latitudes, but right-lateral in the southern hemisphere. We will see whether this is generally true, from the map's view.
NOTE: Since the error in reading maps may be large, the statement showing grids parallel to Latitude lines refers to that within 15 degrees or so. We will be refering to degrees in several ways:
a. That angle departing from a latitude line, e.g. 15 degrees from being parallel or E-W within 15 degrees. There could be some information in the amount and direction of curvature of grid liines away from Latitude lines (notice that the curvature reverses when viewing lines near South America, compared to North A.);
b. The span of Latitude coverage, e.g. from the equator to 15 degrees N; and
c.The rotation of a continent CW or CCW 15 degrees over time (as for South America). This refers to an areal rotation.

Lunar and Earth Tides and the Ellipsoidal Globe: terms and Mechanics
The Moon affected the shape of the Earth at least two ways, throughout Time. Originally, as the moon revolved about the earth it caused the earth to deform at the equator- creating a bulge due to the gravitational attraction of the larger mass. This is an ellipsoidal re-configuration. If the earth were originally spherical, it has been extended by nearly 20 miles at the equator, by the pull of the moon, but also by the centrifugal force of its spin (equatorial diameter is a few miles larger than a diameter through the north and south poles) and these two influences may not be separated to determine which was dominant.
Similarly, the moon has a bulge at its face pointed toward the earth, which is caused by the larger gravitational attraction of the earth. This bulge and the increased gravitational attraction is great enough to prevent the moon rotating referenced to the earth. Of course, the moon does rotate once monthly in a revolution about the earth, but the moon rotates only 1/28th as fast as the earth (one rotation per revolution). Hence it pulls on the earth- causing a slowing of the equatorial velocity. This results in a slowing of the earth’s spin throughout time. This slowing causes two new factors to occur- that of decreased centrifugal force and consequent decreased bulge at the center (considering that the Earth is plastic enough to react to this reduced rotation rate), and a longer day. This can be anticipated to re-configure the earth’s surface as follows:
The shrinkage of the bulge will cause the earth’s surface to crack and fall toward the center- creating normal faulting;
The larger mass of Earth at the equator will reverse that which was initiated at earlier times- if the moon pulled on the surface of the earth causing it to effect left-lateral faulting, now it will show a right-lateral movement; and
Shearing will occur at significant intervals between the more northerly latitudes relative to that at the equator. This is to say that as the moon originally created a lag at the equator, causing the reduced velocities, then this effect will become lesser with time at low latitudes.

What to look for on the ocean basin maps:
A shrinking equatorial bulge should create an overall movement to the right (right lateral faulting) for the transforms near the equator (RELATIVE TO CRUST NORTH OF EB). Between the Tropic of Cancer and Capricorn, the segment should move westward with time. Should there be reversals in this behavior within the segment, this should be due to other influences.
One may visualize all this by referencing how one looks at the daily sunrise- the sun rises in the east, that is, the earth is rotating toward the east, similarly to the moon (the moon rises in the east and sets in the west). Originally, the moon would have retarded the earth spin, making the north latitudes appear to resist or create right lateral faulting along a latitude line. A rotation is a term for spin of the earth or moon, while a revolution is the entire travel of the earth about the sun, or the moon about the earth. The tilt of the earth’s poles creates the Tropics of Cancer and Capricorn, which will change with precession, presently at about 23 degrees north and south latitude. Wobbling of the poles may be visualized as a spinning Top, used in your childhood, which will change the precession in the air (non-vertical movement of the angle of tilt of the top) as some outside influence disrupts the spin. When one touched the spinning top with your finger, it both precessed (its tilt changed) and wobbled (it tilted erratically)
3. Major upheavals occurred in the Earth’s segments, at the 41 m.years ago time (Oligocene epoch), as is shown on the Hawaiian Island- Emperor Seamount chain- as a kink (or angular departure from the older N-S lineament) in the linear presentation of the island chain and underwater seamounts. This is conjectured to occur due to a major event or impact in the crustal history- probably due to the impact of the Indian subcontinent with the now Himalayan highlands (there could be other scenarios, such as a sudden wobble or impact from space). NOTE: THIS INFLECTION (SUBSEQUENTLY)HAS BEEN FOUND TO RESULT FROM ROTATION OF THE QUADRANSPHERE- WHERE THE NA CONTINENT ROTATES FROM ICELAND TO HAWAII. View the Hawaiian chain going NW-ward, where the discontinuity occurs at the southerly end of the N-S seamount trend, coincident with a major transform coming from the CA coast near Mendocino. This is a major clue for interpretation of the various deviations of linear trends or transforms. NOTE: We will refer back to this 41 m.y. transition, since it lies within the time span of 100 m.y. since the Cretaceous Period when there has not been other sudden obvious Polar Wanderings of a significant amount.
4. Deviation, southerly, of the almost E-W transform trend does not cease at the Equator, but continues until the Tropic of Capricorn is passed- then becomes more northerly compared to the more southerly deviation in north latitudes (looking away from the young coasts of Americas in both cases). This could occur as Wandering of the Earth’s spinning axis has moved the equator from its earlier location at the Tropic of Capricorn.
I have not visited any South Pacific locations, except those in the Western Pacific- such as Fiji, hence will confine my remarks to that north part of the largest plate on the globe- the Pacific Plate.
5. Major breaks in fault trends occurs near the city of Los Angeles, and this is the location of another transform fault which continues westerly until the Hawaiian chain is reached. This yields another piece of information- that transforms do not continue indefinitely under the continental Crust. Evidently, the Crust is too thick for the influence of the Moon, tides, and gravitational effects to be noticed more than a few 100 kilometers inland. NOTE: THIS HAS SUBSEQUENTLY FOUND TO BE DUE TO LATITUDES BANDS OF ABOUT 8 DEGREES EACH, SOME OF WHICH ARE RIGHT LATERAL AND SOME LEFT LATERAL, SURROUNDING ROTATING CORIOLIS CELLS. The Basin and Range, B&R, might be impinged, but essentially the Colorado Plateau, CP, has its own separate history (not significantly influenced by transform faults). However, the influence of major fractures allowing extrusion and intrusion of molten mantle to pop upward may be due to the stress regime occurring when transforms cause change from compression to extension of the continental crust. A last feature from the Pacific Basin map is that of :
6.overlap of varying-age transforms. The most recent set has a more distinct presentation- compared to that of the now dying older set. The dimmer one will be the older.

The Eastern Pacific Map will be shown below for ease of use:

NOTE: The complete article discussing Transforms and Mantle Plumes has a link on the right side of the BLOG.

Transforms, cont’d
Using the previously-catalogued Pacific Basin presentations, let’s now try to determine what has happened since the early Mesozoic Period, from the map shown above. Here’s the time-line:
In the Mesozoic, which is the oldest outcrop found on the ocean floor, the Pacific basin was moving northward, as shown by the occurrence of Emperor Seamounts. One of these is about to be subducted (shoved under) below the Aleutian chain of Alaska- Meiji Seamount’s age of 70 million years has been measured by radiometric means, and I will take the geologists’ word for it.
A Parabola-shaped Incursion (draped by clouds) creates mountains and volcanoes in AK

The Pacific plate continued moving northward under Alaska until 41 m.years, when an impact occurred, causing the chain to appear to be diverted southeastward. Remember that the real crustal motion was northward, but the islands popped upward as the crust slid over the underlying heat source. The apparent movement was first southward, then southeastward- the opposite of the crustal movement (considering that the heat source is stationary in the underlying deep crust or mantle).
From Oligocene time (41 m.y.) until the Pliocene (apprx.2 m.y.ago), the apparent creation of islands has trended SE-ward. Then, as is shown by the almost N-S-ward presentation of Maui and Hawaii’s volcanoes- Maui to Mauna Kea to Mauna Loa to Loihi (the latest underwater volcano, to the south of Hawaii), the apparent formation of islands is more to the south. This is in agreement with studies in Verde Valley and its volcanoes, where craters burst along NW-SE linears until mid-Pliocene, when fractures re-oriented towards N-S, at approximately 2 m.y. age.
See below photo for a new locus of young HI volcanic flows:

At the 2 million year age, the formation of islands was influenced by passage of the sea bottom over (creation of) another transform- this one trending almost eastward all the way to the Baja Peninsula of Mexico. This transform has influenced the western coast of Baja, near Isla Cedros and Bahia Sebastian Vizcaino. It is also true that the Pacific plate is now moving northward under the state of Alaska, yielding a parabola-shaped chain of mountains over the subduction zone. This is the zone of vulcanism occurring now at the contact of the Pacific plate and the Alaskan landmass.
Above is shown Google west Baja California- Bahia Sebastian



There are 3 major transforms shown on the North Pacific Basin map, and these all must be incorporated into the scheme of shearing caused by earth-slowing and moon-influenced faulting. These are the Mendocino-seamount kink, the Maui-San Sebastian anomaly, but what about the Midway- Los Angeles kink? It appears to be only of slight significance, compared to the other two anomalies. There is a trend away from the SE-NW presentation, going southward towards Lisianski Island in the Hawaiian chain (but finally continuing on the SE-NW track again at an approximate 8 cm/year pace). All of these linears or transforms, including many others of lesser magnitude, might be thought of as formed by the curvature of the earth, which puts a bind on plate movements as spherical segments encounter others which interfere with linear presentations as they all move along a curved surface.
Mantle Plumes have been suggested as the source of the rigid Hot Spot, for formation of the Hawaiian Islands, but there has been no confirmation of this conjecture, what with Tomography from earthquakes being used to view slices of the Crust and Mantle (see the link for Mantle Plumes on the right side of this Blog- at the top). Rather, it appears that the heat is diffuse in the crust and that some unknown mechanism is collecting it to form a local anomaly (island formation from extrusive volcanoes). Bearing on this feature is the observation that the “Ring of Fire” is moving outward in all directions around the Pacific Basin, and this makes it appear that vulcanism at linear island trends is the source of the outward movement. Should there be a movement below the subduction circle (the Ring of Fire) back towards the center of the Pacific to re-generate the heat, this might solve the dilemma. It could be that the circulation is lateral, going into the mantle or deep crust and then returning towards the center of the ring of fire to re-start the entire entity. It should be further noted that there are many linear presentations of volcanic islands or trends in oceans, especially in the South Pacific, but that there are few in other basins of the world. On continents, such as SW USA, there are linear basaltic emission trends, again aligned either NW-SE or N-S. It could be that many minor volcanic trends in the ocean basins have not yet been discovered.
The East Pacific Rise yields information about the relative ages of transforms. This is seen as overlays of a young spreading center over older transforms- which continues into the Gulf of California (Sea of Cortez). The shearing fault system continuing through the state of CA is definitely the youngest- being well-documented as happening now. Hence the East Pacific spreading center is youngest, as is shown by its overlying the more northerly rifts near Mexico.


Above is shown Google west Baja California- Bahia Sebastian

The hint here is that we are looking at least two phenomena:
Spreading due to the influence of radioactive or other heat; and
Shearing, due to the slowing of the Earth as it gets interference from the Gravity of the moon.

8. What then is causing the overlying transforms to dominate? The answer can be that wobbling or polar wandering moves the axis of rotation, hence re-orientation of shear lines as the earth slows. Old transforms become de-activated, as the earth spins along a new axis. Possibly this can be sorted out by investigating islands which have known ages- such as the Galapagos and Easter Island, and which are away from the center of the Pacific (and its dilemma). Should we be able to solve the more simple Hawaiian-Emperor Seamount chain puzzle, we might be able to get a glimpse into the vastly more complex South Pacific and its multiplicity of lineaments of volcanic islands.


The S. Pacific is vastly more complex than the north, with many more linearly-arranged volcanic islands.

Conjectures about East Pacific Transform Faulting
It is my belief that all necessary information is available for solving the Puzzle of the crustal slices (Transform Faulting) being made in the Pacific Basin. It is very complicated, but the timed changes are all represented on the Geographical Map. One must be able to sort out the various events and assemble a sequence of the movement of Earth Segments through time and space. Geologists have not been able to put together a theory for these, partly because they are still in the classification phase. They should move on to the analysis phase, which requires Geophysical Methods.
Geological suggestions in the past have been centered around the idea that the deep Mantle has convection currents which circulate upward through oceanic ridges (basaltic extrusions), and which then spread outward in opposing directions to move with time and gravity to sink in distant subduction zones for later re-cycling. No one has been able to locate these deep Mantle heat sources or Plumes, especially with new methods using Tomography for analyzing slices of the earth (which may be unusually hot). The sources of heat which drove the process were thought to have been initiated from unusual aggregations of radioactive compounds, such as K, Th, and Uranium, but now from analyses made on other planets, the idea of gravity and attraction-surges of mass (as moons vary in distance from mother planets) between different bodies in space is given more importance.
Photos have been relayed from space, which show that planet-moon tides are important for creating fractures, faulting, and heat of friction- which appear to create vulcanism. Associated with the Plume hypothesis is the formation of linear tracks of islands, such as The Hawaiian chain, which do not have the characteristics of spreading and subduction zones. These, of which Hawaii is the most studied, form a linear track through geologic time where shield volcanoes arise, are gradually compacted and sheared, and finally sink of their own weight over the course of 50 million years or so. The big isle of Hawaii is thought to be the most recent of these, with the exception of Loihi- which is an undersea extrusion not yet reaching the Pacific surface.
The first problem to attack is that of determining whether the tracks of young volcanoes on the big island of Hawaii are on a permanent trend away from the main linear trend of NW-SE. If the trend is decidedly at variance with older tracks, this would indicate that something in the last 2 million years (age of Maui, the next island to the north) has influenced the orientation of volcanoes. There is a major transform trending westward towards Maui which could have been transited by the island trend to yield a new orientation on the map. To check this possibility, one can study the deviation of Lisianski Island, far to the NW, from the same trend- which produced a temporary deviation to the south, somewhat similar to that noticed at Hawaii, shown by Mauna Kea, Mauna Loa and Loihi. It could be that wobbles or wandering of the Earth's axis temporarily disrupts the progression of volcano formation from long-term trends. A view of Lisianski is shown on the big picture of the entire above-water sequence of islands and volcanoes:



According to the photo, Lisianski did deviate to the west of the normal orientation, similarly to what is happening in the last 2 million years at Maui to Loihi. Is this just a temporary deviation due to a wobble of the earth, which later corrects to return to the long-term trend of the islands- about N 60 W movement of the Crust over a conjectured "Hotspot", or 60 degrees from north on the apparent presentation of island locations? Note error in direction on the above photo labelling- should be N 60 W.

The E. Pacific Rise indicates how Transforms are "transformed" upon approach to a Continental Mass.


Itemized Types of Seafloor Disruptions


Guam and the Marianas represent Subduction (active vulcanism at a line of diving seafloor), which is rare in the open Ocean.


Other Islands I have "collected" while serving in the Pacific area include Kwadjalein, Guam, Manus, Ulithi, Truk and Johnson I, in addition to the usual suspects (Indonesia for 3 years will be treated separately).

Below are PIX from Wikipedia, which show the geographical treatment of the East Pacific Rise- which will be studied to cast light on active occurrences in the greater basin.


Above diagram presents the positioning of an active "spreading Center"- EPR, and how it relates to right lateral faulting trending through Gulf of Cortez and CA

Anomalies to be explained, for the E. Pacific transforms.

the East Pacific is the simplest of all Pacific basins, any deviations from expectations have to be explained before proceeding.

These should be incorporated before proceeding further. Studying the accompanying geographical and geological maps and diagrams yields the following aberrations:
The colored transform map from CA to HI has three major transforms, and they in gross presentation indicate that there is a general trend of seafloor movement to the east- going south from the kink in the HI-Emperor seamount chain. Although there are reversals within the movement, this represents a gross deviation of the equatorial region toward the east. This would indicate an overall left-lateral movement referenced to the N. Pacific seafloor. This opposes the lateral movement onshore in CA, which overall has a gross trend right-laterally;
The East Pacific Rise is a spreading zone trending mostly N-S and it gives way to a right-lateral fault system upon entering the Gulf of CA. The North American plate NA, effects a profound influence on the EPR system;
My personal measurements on Whidbey Island, which is south of the thrust of the NA plate going westward towards the Juan de Fuca plate, JdF, yields left lateral faulting near the contact- creating NW-SE faulting and fracturing for the entire island. There seems to be some circulation of mass from Mendocino, CA to the Devil’s Mountain fault running E-W on the north side of Whidbey I, so that the movement slip in CA is reversed. Although the lateral slip is reversed, the trends are NW-SE in both cases. However, upon measuring the trends west of Mendocino, the movement is again changed to left lateral as in Whidbey Island; and,
The overall assessment of the Pacific Basin is shown by the “Ring of Fire” where the gross movement is outward in all directions, but internally within the system there are aberrations such as the EPR (which has movements in opposing directions- boh in transforms and for spreading), and the 3 transform movements toward CA- which alternate in direction. Note the reversal of trend with the LA to Lisianski Island (which is opposite to those on either side of its transform). The strong hint is: as the edges of the Pacific Basin (continental Crust) are approached, there is major interference with the trends set in the deep basin, so that circulation of crustal mass at boundaries is grossly changed. This is to say, the influences of the Moon and Tides, slowing of the diurnal cycle, and redistribution of the equatorial bulge are much more straightforward for the Pacific Basin than for the continental Crust. For this reason, it should be much simpler to analyze the transforms at the ocean floor, than to reach conclusions about the large thrusts and vulcanism-intrusion events for continents.

Solution to Aberration 1- Mendocino lateral faulting reversal
The explanation for the lateral faulting change at Mendocino Point, CA is shown in the Google Map below. This allows a major advance in understanding transforms in the Pacific Ocean.

Offshore Mendocino, there is a spreading zone which marks the boundary of a minor plate separation from the main Pacific plate. The E-W transform at the southern edge of this zone can be seen to correlate with Mt. Lassen location (looking directly eastward along a latitude line)- which is the most southerly of the Cascade volcanoes lying some few 100 kilometers east of the Mendocino anomaly. Further, the spreading zone will represent an N-S orthogonal to the Mendocino transform, and cause movement in opposing directions looking E-W. Therefore the reversal of the right-lateral faulting on land becomes left-lateral in the ocean floor, across the spreading zone.
This feature is important in understanding one of the other anomalies- that of the EPR spreading. It appears that transforms are influenced by approach to a continental land mass. Not only is the land lighter in density, so that subduction occurs under it, but the additional crustal thickness creates barriers to transforms which easily split the thin crust in the deep ocean.
Should the Mendocino transform, which is coincident with the dogleg in the Pacific, have occurred due to an impact (such as the collision of India with what is now the Himalayas), then other doglegs miggt be investigated for major global collisions. Here is my conjecture for this behavior:
The Laramide E to NE thrusting, which continued after 65 m.years until the Eocene in the Mountain states, created uplifts which eroded in the Oligocene. Ones I have done field work on include the Poison Canyon formation- eroding from the Cimarron Mts. in NM, Rim Gravels which began to fill Verde Valley in the Oligocene, and Olympic Mts. which overrode the Olympic Peninsula after the Eocene. The first two are a result of a change from compression experienced during the Laramide to Extension in Oligocene time. Should the dogleg in the Hawaiian chain at 41 m.years have occurred because of a major Crustal collision of some type, this would have severed all three of these plate features and instituted a major re-arrangement of stresses in the earth’s crust. Before the collision, the Pacific crust was moving northward, and afterwards toward the NW, as evidenced by the alignment of HI islands and seamounts before and after the event.
After the impact, initiation of thrusting of Eocene sediments commenced in the Olympic Mountains, vulcanism commenced in the Verde Valley (some hot springs remain), and the intrusive Cimarron Mountains uplifted. These NV to CO and NM features represent Extension, replacing Compression which transpired during the Laramide episode. Compression continues for the Cascades, caused by spreading offshore, although there is north movement of the Pacific plate west of the spreading zones.
Aberration 3 analysis
Should the Equatorial Bulge and its shrinkage with time be a dominant influence on formation and orientation of transforms, then at latitudes greater than 45 degrees the bulge should disappear and there be no correlation with transform changes. At large latitudes there should be no further young transforms (not allowing for polar wandering, which would have changed the location of the equator). Should this be the correct mechanism, this would allow for a sorting-out of polar wandering versus thermal creation of ocean basin transforms and spreading zones.
The Pacific Ocean north of 40 degrees, where the Mendocino transform occurs, seems to exhibit the obliteration of previous transforms and N-S linears, indicating agreement with the ellipsoidal earth diminution conjecture. South of the equator, there is a completely different story: the trends of transforms do change orientation upon crossing the Tropic of Capricorn latitude, but obliteration of transforms does not occur. The “Big Picture” is that there are major departures from the analysis suggested by the ellipsoidal diminution influence. The shape of the southern portion of South America near Antarctica is that of a completely different mechanism of transform formation. We will have to propose a mechanism for the North Pacific east of the Hawaiian Islands, and hope to get a clue from this for the relative importance of gravity- earth slowing to the dynamics for the whole earth.
A possible reason for the South Pacific disagreement mentioned above is that due to a change of location of the equator. This is given as a possibility, since the following evidence is observed for the equator having been moved (due to polar wandering) in the last 2 million years:
a. The North Pole may have been situated 20 or more degrees south of its present location, and the ice age formation influenced (initiated at about the 2 million year age also), or started from the present Arctic Circle. Rearrangements would have influenced the climate on the other side of the globe, and polar wandering would have caused Europe to lie further south on the tilted globe compared to now. Since Europe incurred the ice age also, this does not add substantiation.
b. Milankovich proposed a cyclical nature of precession, wobbling, and eccentricity of the earthly orbit to cause global cooling, but the total time of the largest influence is on the order of 100 k-years, not millions of years (for the span of the combination the three cycles).
c. Meteor Crater in AZ or others in the last two million years would influence the precession and wobbling of the earth. It is not in the scope of this investigation to incorporate events such as these, but with the Kt impact (Cretaceous to Tertiary impact of a large meteor near Yucatan, Mexico) studies, the influence of outer space impacts upon earth has gotten more attention. My estimate of the age of Meteor Crater, AZ from erosion transpired is on the order of 100 k-years, although Wikipedia states that it is about 50,000 years of age. This order of magnitude difference relegates it to a minor influence on the 2 million year transform change entity.
Rather than explore the South Pacific, immediately, I will concentrate on what I have investigated in the field- particularly on the intersection of North American and San de Fuca plates as shown on Whidbey Island. This is an active faulting and fracturing province, and may shed light on the appearance of minor plates whenever the Pacific nudges the North American continent (in this case during the Oligocene).

The rearrangement of crustal stresses is a major feature toward understanding this behavior, and it can easily be monitored everywhere with measurements of alignment and movement along sets of parallel fractures.

SE Pacific Ocean shows gross orientation of Transforms- E-W, as the crust between SA and Anarctica is approached


Tentative Conclusions, for Transforms, Spreading, and Plate movements
The analysis for the Eastern Pacific, for the portion which has the least complication (HI to CA), indicates that the direction of transforms orientation and gross plate movement are almost independent of each other, in the deep ocean basin. Although transform orientation seems to be influenced by approach to a continental mass, in the ocean basin it is almost monotonous- with the movement of plates being orthogonal to it, or with shear of individual segments being at large angles to the present movement of the dominant plate. Hence we are analyzing at least two separate phenomena:
1. Slowing of the earth’s spin (length of day- LOD- increase), due to tidal influence of the moon and reduction of equatorial bulge with time. This effect will cause the equatorial diameter to decrease and create normal faulting as the earth contracts. The equatorial bulge decrease causes the zone between 45 degrees north and south, relative to more distant latitudes, to shear as the bulge drags against the polar masses. Although the magnitude of the shear or relative velocity change has not been incorporated, it seems clear that there would be shear along latitude lines. One may visualize this as an effect similar to the Coriolis effect for weather systems- the differential velocities at large latitudes causes veering to the right of objects moving in the northern hemisphere. For high pressure air masses, the attempt to move outwardly with a right deviation creates clockwise-spinning cells in the N. Hemisphere. The overall circulation is caused by higher latitudes having lesser velocities along a latitude line than ones closer to the equator. This shear to the right is called the Coriolis Effect. Any object moving in any direction in N. hemisphere will move to the right for the same reason. Even such slow movement as upward growth of tree trunks creates a rotary movement with time up the tree. Draining the bathtub creates a similar counter-clockwise vortex. The effect, though omni-present, is minor and can be easily overcome with disruptive forces, so that one can find the reverse behavior, and
2. Pacific plate movements appear to be circulatory, that is they are due to thermal influences- whether by friction from daily tidal movements or from radioactive decay. Other sources of heat have been suggested by geophysicists, such as friction between the core and mantle (due to a bumpy contact or to rotational velocity changes at the boundary). Some evidence has been promulgated to show that the different densities of core and mantle create a frictional drag.
There is such a stark contrast of orientation and presentation of transforms south of the 45S latitude compared to the North Pacific map, that this creates likelihood that an important factor may become obvious in any analysis of the transforms on the Pacific map. We will proceed with this contingency, hoping that a detailed progressive analysis will lead the way to conclusions for all ocean basins and their transforms and spreading centers:


Transforms near the Chilean coast orient similarly to those near CA- approximately E-W and perpendicular to the coastline. Further out to sea, the major trans-global trends are not similar.

Orthogonal Occurrence of Transforms at Continental Coasts
Another clue to the derivation of transforms is their usual perpendicularity (or approximation, within 1/15th of a circle) to the coastline being approached. Since the subduction of plates is approximately parallel to the coastline, this hints that their origin partly determines the orientation of transforms at the shelves and possibly further at sea. A more likely explanation is that the coastline orientation and shape occurs as a result of the impingement of one plate onto another. Then, since there are always orthogonals to stress direction (due to the curvature of the earth and to the reactions to a major stress), transforms near coastlines automatically form. The map shows that these are not always continuations of the same orientation noticed further out to sea, hence subduction direction does not orient transforms there.
It appears that transforms over shelves and for a distance into the interior are dominated by the continental crust and not the tidal influences conjectured for the open ocean floor.
Orthogonality is another major clue to the occurrence of transforms.
A reason for this feature can be that there is a significant thickness difference between the two continental and marine crustal divisions. This result has usually been explained by Isostasy- that the crustal column is determined by the product of thickness x density, ρ x height, where high density seafloor basaltic crust is thinner than low density granite-like crust. Granite at low confinement has a density of about 2.65, contrasted to basalt of near 3-4 grams/cubic centimeter. Consequently, tidal influences may more easily shear thin ocean floor basalt than silica-like crust. Some of the daily tidal influence may be measured in water wells, where there is a twice-daily pulsing of the earth as the moon’s influence waxes and wanes. Pressure testing shows a sinusoidal change of the water column, as the borehole squeezes (shrinks and expands) on the easily-moved liquid. Continental crust contains much greater porosity, filled by fluids, and this allows for a fatigue-resistant structure, contrasted to low porosity basalt under a compressive stress of 3000 psi from the salt water above. Nevertheless, continental sedimentary rock has parallel fractures which show that regional stresses are transmitted over many kilometers distance, and this is possible only where there is considerable brittleness in the porous rocks (as opposed to plasticity or fluidity, which increases with temperature). It is seen in brittle faulting and fracturing from earthquake profiles with depth that plasticity dominates (eliminating brittleness) after crossing into the deep crust or mantle- where temperatures are excessive.

Other geothermal anomalies not fitting the Subduction and Hotspot Classification.
Still unincorporated in our scheme of determining the motivation for crustal movements, as to how they relate to vulcanism and subduction, are 3 more anomalous cases:
1. Guam and the Marianas, where I lived for almost 2 years;
2. South Pacific, including New Zealand and Polynesia; and
3. Yellowstone geothermal area, which occurs in mid-continent.
Mentioned previously is the abberation of the Marianas, an island arc, which has vulcanism occurring on the small islands to the north, but not on the larger islands to the south, and where the deepest oceanic trench occurs nearer the older islands where there is no vulcanism. A typical volcanic array- such as the Cascades- has vulcanism occurring above the diving edge of a plate boundary, all young and surface-expressed above the linear contact at depth where the crust is being intruded. There is either a line of volcanoes above the deeper contact of excessive water-bearing rock, in the shape of an arc for shallow angle of dive, or straight-line shaped for the steepest angle of dive. Although the Marianas are arcuate, there seems to be a progression of vulcanism with time to the north (not a line of volcanoes). Further, this occurs in the deep ocean, far from a continental mass (1200 miles to the Philippines- also an arc) which might be the target of subduction. This occurrence suggests that there is lateral circulation within the basin, not dependant upon continental collision.

The western Pacific basin shows several concentric arcuate arrangements of islands, of which The Marianas and Guam are prominent.


Guam and Saipan are shown as the largest islands in the chain, with the Marianas trench to their SE.
The case of the South Pacific will be treated separately, and the Yellowstone has the following anomalous behavior:
a. Although the vulcanism has left a clear pattern of progression to the east with time, it is different from normal subduction or hotspot activity by virtue of its being violent (siliceous non-basaltic type) and in the middle of a continent. Its track through Idaho and Montana fits with the finding that the NA continent has moved westward through the Tertiary to impinge upon the more westward San de Fuca plate. This minor plate now appears to have broken off from the Pacific plate as it approached the continent in late Tertiary, and to be distinct now (as shown by spreading zones) in its orientation and present movement. The factor to retain for further investigation is whether a minor plate becomes a separate identity only upon approach to a continental mass.
b. It is not a subduction type phenomenon, but an isolated extrusion site- which incorporates siliceous crust from continental sediments as the magma rises. It is close to the ground surface, and continually emits steam, geysers, and fumeroles now.
c. It is similar to the HI vulcanism, in that it follows a linear track with geologic time and which exhibits a single extrusion site- following a linear progression with time (but not similar in rock composition).

Marianas Islands and Guam

Guam is unique among the Marianas, since it is the southernmost of the islands, and it is still part of the American identity. The other islands in the chain are independent, after having been a Trust Territory under the United Nations. Guam is the largest of the chain, and closest to the deepest part of the Marianas Trench- the deepest (almost 36k feet depth, at the Challenger Deep) in the globe. Perhaps it will yield a clue why it is part of an arc which is in the open ocean, and not a result of a subduction near the continent of Asia. It appears to be a part of a long arcuate chain, and east of some other arcs, with some apparent clues as to its fit into the global explanation of dynamics of the crustal movements:
The curvatures of the arcs appear to decrease in diameter with time, considering that the older arcs to the west are less curved. The age appraisal is found from the lack of islands and vagueness (depths), as a scan to the west is made on the global portion of the west Pacific map shown above. This change of radius of curvature, to me, means that the dive of the plate into the crust is shallower to the east- something is interfering with subduction, which progressively becomes more pronounced with time.
The progression of arcuate traces is to the east, or possibly SE, with time.
This again is estimated from the occurrence of uneroded islands remaining and from the loci of sub-sea arc foci which show up on the map. This conclusion must be based on the 3 arcuate traces just to the west of Guam, and not on the trace which includes Palau to Parece Vela- which remain as viable islands (although marginal in the case of Parece Vela, which barely appears above sea level at high tide). My translation of the name is “A Watchman Appears”, which was the case once for myself- when crossing the Pacific from Guam to Okinawa without a loran set, stars for celestial navigation, or a good compass other than the pilot’s windshield instrument. The reef saved my skin, since I had otherwise no way of navigation to Kadena without using dead reckoning. I was able to get noon latitude by sextant, but that was about the same time as arriving over the landmark. The aircraft commander – a colonel, commander of the Anderson Air Base- harrumphed to me about my accuracy of arriving exactly over Kadena at the estimated time of arrival (eta), and I replied that I was indeed lucky, since the old C-47 had no navigation aids, no loran set, no accurate compass, or nothing except my gray matter to prevent us from certain doom after passing the “Point of No Return” on this otherwise uneventful flight. On the return trip, all of these "aids" miraculously appeared- giving the name PARECE VELA new meaning!
Notice that the three arcuate structures, which are pronounced in the vicinity of Guam, seem to define a “bulge” on the map presentation, indicating that some local phenomenon has interfered with the otherwise normal array.
This bulge is terminated to the north near Iwo Jima- the site of a current volcano near the Bonin Trench and the famous WW2 battle for an emergency aircraft landing site, and to the south near the atolls of Ulithi and Yap. Ulithi was also visited by me, and it is an unimpressive coral atoll, inhabited by Micronesians who distinguish their rank by their number of tattoos (fostered upon them by the Japanese occupiers during WW2). This bulge might be investigated by those who believe that there are “humps” in the contact between the crust and mantle, or between the mantle and core, but I have no way of looking further at this 3-dimensional feature. This is another clue to subduction precesses, but it appears that the Marianas chain is the location of a less complicated dynamics- compared to the South Pacific.
Reviewing, the inferences are still the same as initially:

Pacific Plate movements are simpler in the N. Pacific zone between the Marianas and CA coast, having only two unexplained major aberrations- the HI hotspot and the Marianas- with the approximate E-W transforms and N-S subductions being the most obvious displays.
Again, continents represent a barrier to transforms and determine their orientation.

Pacific plate displays are much more complicated in the South Pacific, with many irregular transforms, linear arrangements of islands at diverse angles of orientation and inexplicable displays near and south of the equator. Conversely, in the SE Indian Ocean, the ridges and trenches trace almost E-W, with transforms oriented along longitude lines (east of the 90th meridian, where the Tertiary path of the Indian Subcontinent is clearly traced- the Ninety East Ridge).
Again, transforms orient toward the southern coastline of Australia, while spreading centers parallel it.
Transforms and ridges are perpendicular to those found in N. Pacific
The only new inference concerns the bulge of the Marianas- it appears to indicate that there is a circulation of the crust which dives shallower with time (towards Asia) as the Pacific basin expands with the “Ring Of Fire”. It might be inferred that the East to North Pacific is much simpler to analyze because it has no continents to cause interference there, until AK, CA or Guam impede its movements.


Let's look at the Atlantic Ocean,shown above and below:<


Transform Faulting in the Atlantic
The pattern of transforms in the other (than Indian) Equatorial Ocean gives additional information about movement of the Crust in the region near the Equatorial Bulge. In this case, the Romanche fracture zone (between Africa and SA) lies essentially on the equator, having a slight tilt to the south- toward the west, opposite to that in the NP. There is monotony to the pattern of grid lines- tilting to the north in the north latitudes and south in the south (looking from E to W) , but the major break is just at the equator. The overall appearance is that for a previous equator lying somewhat to the north, contrasting with the anomalies in the Pacific lying south of it. This would hint at a North Pole position somewhat south of its present position in the time before the polar wandering or wobble prior to the Pliocene (2 m.y. ago) - similar to that suggested for the Pacific. In this case, the deviation is only about 10 degrees, as contrasted to the 20 degrees or so for the hints on the Pacific map. The bulges in shape for the two continents suggest that the equator crossed the present zero degree line somewhat tilted to the south also (toward SA). All these hints suggest that the previous pole lay somewhere in Alaska and that the previous South Pole lay in Antarctica closer to Africa. The regularity of the transforms is as follows:
Transforms or E-W gridlines tend to point perpendicularly to the coast of Africa (except at the equator, where there is displayed a major break from the monotony);
Older gridlines, closer to continents, are obliterated for some hundreds of miles near all continents. They tend to be better presented on the African side of the Atlantic, and are preserved from 55N to 50S, again indicating agreement that this is an equatorial bulge feature (which should terminate at about 45 degrees, in either north or south directions);
Transforms for the total earth tend to follow the regularity indicated above, except for a major departure in the triangle of Africa, Antarctica, and Australia. This is interdicted by the movement of the Indian subcontinent NE then N toward the Himalayan highlands, where collision is now ongoing. It’s as if this major movement created the present situation of spreading in the Atlantic and anomalous behavior of the Indonesian and South Pacific- where the crust below Australia and India is creating compression for the entire Quadransphere (from the mid-Atlantic ridge to the dateline).


Assessment of Indian Subcontinent Track relation to Transforms Although the original intention of transform evaluation was to determine whether they were related to equatorial Bulge and LOD increase, it now appears they also are regularly related to Subduction and Seafloor Spreading. Consequently, it must be determined which is the dominant influence upon Transforms.
First, it appears that for most of the Globe, transform orientation is generally perpendicular to coastlines (in a broad view). Then, since subduction seems to determine the shape of young coastlines, the two must be intertwined; this however may be true for old coasts from some previous subduction- where there is no cause-and-effect (as in east coast of USA and west coast of Africa). We know that the NW subduction of eastern USA was completed during the Paleozoic and that present near-perpendicularity of transforms is coincidental (Mid –Atlantic Ridge is a Mesozoic and younger phenomenon).
Further, it was shown for Australia that Transforms were perpendicular to the south coast (where there is no subduction) and that transforms appear to be trailing the possible northward movement of that continent. They can appear with crustal movement, even where there is no subduction. And for Australia, they are perpendicular to occurrence elsewhere (in the Pacific and Atlantic)- indicating that S. Australian transforms are not presently LOD or equatorial diminution-related. In this case, however, the anomalous transforms are south of the 40S latitude (indicating a non-bulge location). All of this behavior could be related to the quadrant where there is a major influence from the track of the Indian subcontinent. This cannot be used to negate all the rules found for the rest of the globe, but account must be made of this significant variation.
What can be generalized for this major movement, starting in the Mesozoic (and that is on-going in the Himalayas), which disrupts over a quarter of the southern hemisphere?


It seems unlikely that this disruption is due to the Kt collision in the Yucatan (although there is a minor Interference there), since this collision occurred north of South America, where no obvious distortions occur. It appears that the subcontinent “took off” from its position between Antarctica and SA and has continued to swerve toward India since. And it is still active, producing the highest mountains in the world, and resulting not in subduction- but collision (compression). It is also curious that it moved almost due northerly, producing the ridge along the 90E longitude, once it passed the now-spreading Carlsberg and Mid-Indian ridges. These ridges appear to interdict the older trace of the subcontinent, making them younger, and transform traces are now obliterated for the Arabian Sea and the Bay of Bengal, This obscuration could be due to major siltation and rock flow (turbidites)- which occur over great distances near rivers and unstable coastlines. This movement over a quarter of the globe cannot be related to simple wandering of the polar axis- it must be related to the heat engines of the mantle. Why only a small portion of the earth would interfere with such a major portion is unknown. It seems likely that this is core movement-derived, and therefore not soluble using two-dimensional analyses. It is interesting that its track occurs for the thin crust under the Indian Ocean, and that it is west of the equatorial bulge distortions noted in the SP. It may be that there are similar features under continents, where it is more difficult to decipher them.
The conclusion remains: Work on the transform derivation- not the heat engine entity!

The Indian subcontinent track, near Africa, seems to have interdicted the Mid-Atlantic ridge (making it younger than MAR), and this East then curved to-the-North feature dominates everything near the Indian Ocean. Overall, this is a major clue to the entire southern hemisphere dynamics, from SA, Antarctica, and onto the collision with Asia. The movement must have originated during early Mesozoic Era, making this feature much greater in scope than a re-orientation of polar wandering in the Tertiary. The Indian track and gridlines suggest a manor imbalance of crustal or mantle dynamics, which is still ongoing. Not only is the equator transited, but Atlantic spreading has been disrupted at the conjunction of these two extensional and compressional features. If shear is tidally-influenced, then the heat engine producing global thrusting (compression) is the dominant entity. Since mantle heat sources are not in this purvey, this southern hemisphere feature will have to be isolated, in order to reach conclusions about Transforms. Extension and shear? will be related to gravity and tidal entities, while compression and shear will be related to heat engines.



Theorem for the present Northern Hemisphere
Since the findings so far seem to be pertinent for only half of the globe, it will be projected that the Equatorial Bulge (which created the E-W transforms upon shrinking) has moved, with a significant wandering of the earth’s poles. This could put the previous North Pole at the Tropic of Cancer on the Pacific side and the South Pole at South Africa on the opposing side of the globe, or at least significantly different in location compared to nowb. This movement could have influenced the dynamics of the crust whenever there are continents (the basin which has the lesser of continental contact is the North Pacific). Hence, the dynamics should be simpler for this continent-free region, except for the continental shelves. Further, the N. region should be affected by that occurring south of the present equator, only when some movement across the equator has occurred- such as for India’s colliding with Asia and present interference at the Indonesian islands. A case will be made later that the part of South America occurring south of the equator has not had collisions with the present spreading of the Atlantic, and that Africa has had most of its Tertiary dynamics occurring north of the conjectured equator at a location near the Tropic of Capricorn on the Pacific side of the globe.
The movement of the equatorial bulge would have been effected by a collision of plates at the Oligocene epoch (41 m.y. ago), causing the dogleg in the HI-Emperor Seamount chain, and creating NW-SE fractures for the western US- rather than the previous Laramide collision dynamics. The movements would have been ultimately caused by the polar wandering due to the impact, which would subsequently cause an attraction of the moon to the portion of the globe closer to it. These shearing stresses would have occurred wherever the bulge moved northward to the position occupied until the Pliocene, when wobbling further caused deviation of stresses (dominant fractures now orient N-S). This later re-orientation caused the N. Pacific plate to move toward AK, and the basin and range, B&R, in western US to orient along N-S faulting. Polar wandering which orients the global poles in the approximate present position may be more permanent, whereas wobbling should be somewhat temporary- possibly causing the present deviation of the HI chain from its long term NW-SE orientation, closer to N-S now.
How can we check this theorem?
Find current conclusions about increases in LOD, and gross shrinkage of the equatorial bulge by GPS;
Investigate the region from Madagascar to New Zealand to determine whether the bulge shift has created a trace in the linear arrays of islands; and
Find current results of wobbling and precession measurements from astronomical investigations.

Equatorial Transforms and orientations occur at right angles, one side of Equator compared to the other.

Transforms near Australia (S. of Equator) orient orthogonally to those in Pacific Basin
South Pacific and Indian Oceans
South of the equator, from Madagascar to New Zealand, earth crust movements are irregular, compared to the North. Ignoring the Indian Ocean from this analysis, since the movement of India northward to collide with what is now the Himalayas seems the main aberration of the south global crust interfering with the northern hemisphere, we will look at the ninety east ridge eastward to New Zealand for some pattern of crustal behavior which is different from the N&E Pacific.


The following generalities occur:
Australia appears not to exhibit recent Subduction, having no apparent trenches except for the SW corner (Diamantina trench leads to the Great Australian Bight, a sort of Gulf). Australia with New Guinea seems to be a stable continent, whose neighbors- Indonesia and the South Pacific Islands- exhibit many diverse arcuate features;

Indonesia from Sumatra to Timor (timur means east in Malayan) is a regular arc, with NE to N transforms, which have a bifurcation along the 100th longitudinal meridian. Although Sumatra is partly north of the equator, the Indonesian trenches run mostly E-W, but parallel the N-S trends of the north latitudes once the equator has been crossed. From Sulawesi (previously Celebes) the trends from Borneo to New Guinea turn perpendicular to those south of the equator (N-S, as opposed to E-W for the main Indonesian arc) Note: Sulawesi’s north arm orients E-W ( one degree N Lat), as opposed to N-S for the island south of the equator;
Should wandering of the global poles have caused the equatorial bulge to migrate closer to the present equator, it only becomes apparent in the circle of irregularity from the Java trench, the southeast Indian Ocean trench, to New Zealand, and through the South Pacific west along the equator. A bulge should exist all along any previous equator, and this is not exhibited along the Tropic of Capricorn anywhere else in the global oceans
Attempts to relate the above changes to some sort of thermal barrier at the equator are defeated by the observations that both the Atlantic spreading Center and the East Pacific subduction cross the present equator. The main spreading trenches seem to divide the globe into east and west hemispheres, if anything. Subduction occurs mainly around the Pacific Rim, while spreading occurs for most of the rest of the crust. Interference between continents is apparent at the Scotia Sea (east of Tierra del Fuego), Himalayas, Sulawesi, and in the Caribbean to Central America- all where continents approach each other; and
The impetus of the global surface to equalize its crustal mass by spreading continents around the earth idea also is defeated by noting that India has migrated to the northern hemisphere where most of the land mass occurs. This is an ongoing entity, leaving most of the southern hemisphere land-free, except for
Antarctica, Australia, and the southern tips of SA and Africa; Heat engines driving crustal circulation can still derive frictional heat from earth-moon tide instability, but it is more likely that radioactive heat provides the main bulk of the driving force.
Sorting all this by known physical occurrences:

LOD and Precessional-Wobbling influences The length of Day is currently being researched by physicists, using more accurate GPS from satellites. It seems that portions of increase of day length are due to several influences (weather, tides, core-mantle differences in rotation rate, obliquity of earth orbit, depressions on the surface left by glacier ice, and wobbling. Wandering of poles influences all of these, but the part due to equatorial bulge caused by tidal influence of the moon and sun is small compared to the total effect (one second each 1.5 years, called a leap second). This equatorial bulge diminution due to the Moon’s gravitational field results in a LOD increase of about .02 milliseconds yearly, or about 24 seconds each million years. This 1/3 minute at the equatorial velocity of about 900 nautical miles/hour (15 degrees of arc for each hour time zone) results in shear there of 5.76 statute miles relative to the zone greater than 45 degrees latitude (which is where the bulge should terminate). This accounts for the diminution of the present equatorial bulge. A period of 50 million years, which is near the subduction cycling time for the N. Pacific, calculates that transforms yield 288 miles of shear over the total zone- this would be net slowing for the north Pacific where there are several reversals of the N. Pacific crustal movement over the entire zone. Refer to the colored N. Pacific map, for the E-W movement along transforms, noting that there are several segments. Some segments move eastward and others move westward relative to neighboring parts of the ocean floor crust, with the total effect a net displacement eastward over the zone from equator to mid-latitudes. Geological categorization of segments indicates the net displacement is on the order of several hundred miles for the near-equator seafloor.

Trenches, Transforms, and Landforms are oriented differently in the S. Hemisphere, compared to the N. Further, the orthogonality changes noticeably at the Equator. Notice the curved configuration of islands just south of 0 parallel.

At the Equator, there are a number of Island Trends, which seem to form anomalies in the shape of local circular arrays. Note Sulawesi and Bismark Archipeligo, which are south of the anomalous Challenger Deep.

Note that the overall trend of the islands is concave to the west- which is the direction of movement of a block of earth, which is subducting downwardly, OR, relatively, the island arc is moving eastward.South Pacific Anomalous Areas The SP will be considered as that part of the ocean which is south of the equator, and this portion of the analysis will concern that part which extends from Fiji west to Sulawesi, north of Australia. Although New Zealand is part of the Ring of Fire, it does not portray the factors to be studied:

Circular arrays of islands, trenches, and transforms;
Orthogonal patterns which are at variance with the North Pacific, NP; and
Absence of transform grids, which are so prevalent in NP.
Arrays of islands which are obviously different from the NP include:
Sulawesi north limb, compared to the southerly displays;
Bismarck Archipelago, which occurs just north of New Guinea. I spent time at Admiralty Island which is just north of BA, (but south of the Equator);
Fiji Plateau, which is bounded by Loyalty and New Hebrides Islands; and,
Islands surrounding the Banda Sea- Buru, Ceram, Timor, and part of Sulawesi. I hoped to visit the Komodo dragons, but unfortunately was never able to visit eastern Indonesia, past Bali.
Although the Challenger Deep SW of Guam may be part of this anomaly, it is north of the equator near the Caroline Islands. It will be considered, if there is a hint that the trenches there bear on the SP anomaly.
I am sure that Tectonics professionals will assert that they can explain all these deviations with standard Plate Tectonics Theories, assuming paths of wandering crustal segments (terranes, subduction, and spreading centers). However, after reading a lot of the literature, I feel unsatisfied, and hope that an outsider view will have fewer biases and can proceed without continuing the dogma which is asserted as “established” and therefore not further checked for fit into the worldwide order of known Physics.

Below is shown a part of Google Earth, which portrays the latest photography of SP, which we will analyze:

The first question appearing is:
What is different for the SP, compared to similar circular arrays in the Caribbean-Central America, Scotia Sea (S. Sandwich I.), and the Mauritius Plateau? And the immediate answer is:
These arrays lie between continents or subcontinent paths, where there is Interference or relative movement between two of these. In the case of SP, there is no apparent continent or trace of one next to Australia- the stable block of Crust. It is this term which is projected to allow an answer to those anomalies which do not fit into the current earth dynamics theory. The interference might include LOD change, equatorial bulge diminution, bulges in the Crust-Mantle contact, and mass re-distribution in the Crust, due to glaciation, rebound, erosion, and changes in the isostatic column from trenches, heat loss, and craters from meteors. Since the advent of large-scale life, the crust has become thicker with time (granite has formed by recycling of sedimented basalts after K and other ions have been removed by life-forms). With this influence, it can be expected that there is a major re-distribution of the refuse from Life. All of these effects can be expected to be miniscule, but this was expected also for the supposedly insignificant shrinking of the equatorial bulge- the ellipsoidal changes with time.
Known interferences from continents:
Small-scale influences from terranes are the first cause of interference that I have observed. For the Gulf Islands north of Puget Sound in Canada, there is a regular curvature of trend of islands caused by impact of terranes from the west onto the westwardly-moving NA plate. The islands from San Juan to Salt Spring on to Gabriola gradually turn to the NW from the west thrust of NA plate shown on the Fidalgo peninsula (falsely termed island). This is evidently due to the impact of several terranes (from the west) which can be studied on Vancouver Island, Canada.

Anomaly at Sulawesi (previously Celebes) is curious ffrom the standpoints of the N. part being perpendicular to the S. parts, and being just below the Equator. We will try to understand this phenomenon, without getting into a rock clasification.



First, look at the general area, where Sulawesi originates- north of the Australia plate. Notice that the serious anomalies ocur just south of the Equator, as do others further to the east in the South Pacific
Now, look at Sulawesi for closer detail:

Sulawesi (Celebes) Anomaly While Kalimantan (Borneo) and New Guinea proper (including east part of Irian Barat- West New Guinea) appear to be part of stable platforms, the islands between are extremely anomalous. The trenches seem to fit with the Pacific pattern, north of the equator, while the landforms of Sulawesi are discordant upon crossing the equator. The north limb of Sulawesi trends E-W, while the remainder trends more north-southerly. That this occurs near the Equator makes it a curiosity, as do The Bismarck Archipelago, Banda Sea islands, and the Fiji Plateau much further to the south. Since Sulawesi and Bismarck occur south of another phenomenon at the Challenger Deep, where open sea subduction occurs, on a broad view it appears that there is some Interference not generally catalogued under the standard Plate Tectonics.
One could imagine, falsely, that there was a minor continent in this general region, which has been subducted- leaving only fragments of what has mostly disappeared. The part not seen would have had to have been high density rock; otherwise it would not have been subducted. For the case of Vancouver Island that I am more familiar with (from geological reports), its mostly continental sediments have been transported from somewhere to the west, leaving a block of remnants which have been accreted as Terranes onto the island. This feature doesn’t apply to the area of Sulawesi, since it represents a discontinuity (not a dis-continent-uity). The island limb makes a sharp turn to the east, upon crossing the equator.
There are several of these circular anomalies, so it is best to categorize them from a broad standpoint, before getting down to specific dynamics. Looking at the Bismarck Archipelago, since it is closest and also just south of the Equator, there is a suggestion that there is some interference between the North Pacific floor and the stable New Guinea land mass. The circular appearance suggests that there is a mound in the crust, possibly created by a bump in the mantle. This is different compared to the Sulawesi anomaly, but similar to that noticed for the Banda Sea circular array. Another circular array is that of trenches about the island of Nauru- almost on the equator. The first postulate is that there was rising crust, which created discontinuities in a circular array at the edges of the rise. The discontinuity would have allowed volcanoes to arise, and this might be the case for the New Hebrides and New Britain, but not for Nauru. This reef could have been an extrusion at one time, now covered by corals. Possible lines of ancient volcanoes lie to the east- in the Gilberts and Marshalls, but their linear nature doesn’t fit with the circular array of indentations around Nauru.


Notice the circular arrangement of islands from Nauru to the Solomons.
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Bismarck Archipelago, N. of New Guinea, has a very distinct circular pattern just S. of the Equator.




Note that the overall trend of the islands is concave to the west, or N. for some arrays- which is the direction of movement of a block of earth, which is subducting downwardly, OR, relatively, the island arc is moving eastward.


Note that the overall trend of the islands is concave to the west- which is the direction of movement of a block of earth, which is subducting downwardly, OR, relatively, the island arc is moving eastward.

Projections for the Quadrasphere: 90E to 180W-dateline, along the Equator
The zone of the Pacific bounding the Equator, containing many arrays of islands, is anomalous for both the Pacific Ocean and for the global oceans as a whole. Many of these islands are volcanic, possessing active basaltic emissions and being built by the extrusive process. Some of them are in a circular array, and seem anomalous when the dominant linear arrays for the whole region are considered. These circular arrays are not of the subductive arc variety- those forming volcanoes on the concave side. They tend to have small curved patterns and to have active vulcanism on the convex side. This pattern is anomalous- going against the normal trend. This pattern occurs for The Banda Sea, Bismarck Archipelago, New Hebrides on the west side (but not on the Fiji side), and south of the N. Sulawesi limb (but not on the north side). Further to the east, west of Nauru, volcanism is scant on the convex side, but marked to the east where an obvious linear array terminates this phenomenon (Gilbert to Marshall Islands). Altogether there appears to be compressive westward movement of the Crust in isolated areas from the dateline to East Indonesia, near the Equator.
Added to this is the phenomenon of subducting Pacific plate below the Marianas, where there is no obvious collision of continents. The overall tendency is one where portions of the Pacific plate are moving to the west, forcing circulation of mass downwardly at Indonesia, before the Asian continent is reached. That this happens mainly near the Equator suggests that the Equatorial bulge is involved. This would not be a rise of the Mantle- rather a re-distribution of mass to the west. This could possibly be a result of the movement of the bulge as polar wandering moves the location of the equator.

Should this shuffling of the equatorial bulge be due to wandering of the Earth’s rotational poles, when did it happen? Due to active vulcanism, it would appear to be ongoing, and that means the likely initiation would have been since the re-orientation of the HI trend- since the Pliocene. What event has transpired to cause this precessional shift? The whole entity seems smaller than the event causing the shift from compression to extension after the Laramide revolution (Oligocene shearing, due to termination of the collision of Pacific plate with the West USA, and subsequent movement of the Pacific plate towards Alaska). Possibly it is the approach of Indonesia toward Asia, with creation of the violent Java and Sumatra trenches- where Krakatoa is one of the results. Incidentally I visited this region, on the way to tiger-hunting in South Sumatra, but only saw Anak Krakatoa (K’s child) on the horizon.
Projections to be checked by Geophysicists (not Conclusions)
The Global Equatorial Bulge is shifting to the west, along the Equator, creating arrays of circularly-distributed islands and volcanoes;
This shifting, apparently during the Pliocene until now, occurs due to a wandering of the earth’s orientation of poles;
This shifting becomes a cyclical mass movement, returning to the deep via the Marianas trench; and,
Occurs north of the stable zone of Australia and New Guinea, terminating near the Island of Nauru, east of which the normal linear arrangement of islands and volcanoes resume.

Ocean basin Transforms versus Fracture systems on continents
The analysis of large scale transforms, or Linears (my term), in ocean basins has shown that they are fundamentally at odds with regional fracture systems on continents (as shown by sets of parallel open fractures on a kilometer- or kiloscopic- scale in outcropping rocks). These two entities are observed to be diagonal to each other at times- for example, those for CA coastlines running NW-SE toward the Pacific become E-W upon tracing toward HI on the ocean floor. The appearance is that crustal rock is entirely different, when compared to the ocean floor, as to retained stresses.
Although we know that the Crustal basalt ocean floor is thinner, higher in density, and covered by a fairly-constant datum- sea level, there is some major difference in the ultimate presentation of large-scale cracks on its floor compared to that on the solid portion of continents. What is fundamentally different for crustal rocks on continents compared to those on the ocean floor?
Reviewing, we know that continental outcrops are different from ocean floor rocks:
They are lower in density, since the heavier components have been separated from the original basalt outpourings, and now they possess a large porosity in the resulting sedimentary rocks (larger pore space fraction) which contain light fluids;
They are thicker for the Crust, since the lower density, by a manometer-like effect, requires a larger column to “balance out” the lighter unit weight of the column onto the underlying Mantle (Isostasy);
There is also a compositional difference, since Life has taken some components and preferentially placed them in one or the other of the two regimes (e.g. limestone has been placed mainly in ocean basins, while salts have been dumped in water or have been desiccated to remain in evaporitic basins); and,
Continental rocks are mainly granite-like (including the sediments which derive from them), while ocean floors and islands are mainly basaltic (at least until Life attacks them).
The question still remains: What causes stresses to result in fractures and faulting which are diagonal to that in the ocean basins? Regardless whether the impetus is from tidal effects, heat engines, or mantle-driven movements, the orientation of regional fractures is sometimes different on land compared to undersea.
In addition, the older fracture patterns and open fractures remain with time, e.g. in Verde Valley, the older NW-SE sealed fractures are recognizable even when they are overlain by younger open N-S ones. A subsidiary question: is the 45 degree change significant or characteristic? In Verde Valley, I found N-S open fractures with hot water and strange spring water composition suddenly changing to the NE orientation, upon encountering faulting and rock-compositional changes. I have narrowed this change of occurrence with time to 2 million years ago, by virtue of finding this to be consistent in the Pliocene Verde Limestone (in the Verde Valley, which exhibits the N-S fracture sets, but not the NW-SE sets). Further, I find that the NW-SE orientation continues in Whidbey Island, where the outcrops are mainly Pleistocene (<1 m.y.), indicating that when near an east-west confrontation of plates, the N-S feature has not yet occurred. Simultaneously, in CA both orientations occur- most of CA exhibits NW-SE faulting, with N-S and fractures and linears becoming dominant in the eastern portion where the Basin and Range, B&R, commences. Mammoth Lake demonstrates this feature, where the hot springs and fractures orient N-S, whereas just to the west, mountains, faulting, and linears orient NW-SE.
The overall observation is that continental rock is not fractured in the same direction as nearby ocean floor rock. The continental Crust reacts differently from sea floor Crust, to imposed stresses in basin floor rock.
All this is hinting that the Mantle influences seafloor more than the “slag pile” or residue of the sedimenting process. That is, the Asthenosphere- which is the layer of plasticity in the lower part of the Crust- acts differently for the continents compared to the ocean basins. Visualize the continents sliding along the plastic layer, retaining some coherency- compared to the basaltic islands which are both small, relatively, and closer to the mantle. The large continents possibly can resist the influence of potential changes in the equatorial bulge better. To pursue this contingency, let’s look at Africa- where the Sahara region and the Horn of East Africa in the bulge are unencumbered by vegetation.





Transforms leading to the Horn of Africa There is a parallel-ness to the transforms leading from the Indian Ocean and the east coast of Somalia (but not on the north, where the Gulf of Aden appears). These are almost perpendicular to the Carlsberg Ridge, until it enters the Gulf of Aden and ultimately the Red Sea. This feature is named a Triple Conjunction by geologists, since three linears junction there- Transforms from the Indian Ocean, Spreading centers under The Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, and the Great Rift of Africa. The rift (and the coastline) is the only feature on land showing a parallel-ness with the Indian Ocean Transforms. The others- spreading centers under the water- show angles at odds (but not perpendicular) with the transforms. There is also the same feature exhibited off Mendocino, CA- a 45 degree angle between the north and east coasts of Somalia.

Evidently the diagonal angle shown at Mendocino and the Horn is a rarity, but is a revealing feature which shows the reaction of the heat-engine spreading, when encountering a continental coast.
The Great Rift appears to be a continental feature, creating lakes and volcanoes in a general N-S orientation all the way from Lake Nyssa on the south to the Dead Sea on the north. Since this occurs north of the Tropic of Capricorn, it may have an equatorial bulge diminution component. Recall that the shrinkage of the bulge creates N-S faulting of the normal type- such as the Hurricane Fault in SW Utah. These scarps are characteristic of regional faults which abound near the edges of the Colorado Plateau, Anatolia, and other active uplifting regions of the earth. To isolate these features from those due to geothermal activity, one will have to investigate those outside (at greater latitudes than) the Tropics of Cancer and Capricorn, e.g. the Tibetan Plateau, the Western Plateau of Australia, and Central Siberia.
Is the N-S linear presentation due to Spreading, Bulge Shrinkage, or both? The case of East Africa- rifting, spreading, and vulcanism- is a continental feature, since it occurs from Lake Nyasa to the Dead Sea. Hence it must primarily represent a heat engine entity. The continent of Africa on the east side is moving toward the east- as evidenced by the curvature of the Lake Nyasa, Tanganyika, to Albert trend (curvature concave to the east). This is the same orientation and direction of movement of the Mid-Atlantic ridge, where drift is almost due eastward, for the African side. Also the vulcanism is on the concave side, which is the case for subduction (opposite to that of the circular island arrays, which have volcanoes on the convex side). Since most of the earth’s bulge transforms occur in this mid-latitude zone and are E-W oriented, what’s the difference? Again, this reinforces the finding that transforms do not obey the same rules for continents as for the ocean basins. Transforms appear to have influence on faulting and continental rocks just a few hundred kilometers inland, compared to thousands of kilometers under the ocean floors. All this demonstrates another feature: as Africa is moving eastward on its west side, it accelerates this movement, once the East African lakes are reached. If the arcuate display indicate subduction (no mountains, hence no compression), the very survival of the lakes indicates spreading or extension (rifting). That is, if the western part is bulge related, the eastern part is both bulge and heat engine related; while bulge diminution may determine orientation of transforms, the cracks they create allow the heat engine to operate more easily through these openings to the Earth’s Surface. Arcuate displays will be the determinant for finding the heat engine activity. We will use this rule, temporarily until obviated, for separation of the two entities:
Island arcs and geographical features possessing vulcanism on the concave side will indicate geothermal incipience, and
Circular island and geographical displays, with vulcanism on the convex side, will indicate Earth-Moon-bulge-LOD gravitational mechanics.
We will have to review the statistics, or global occurrences, to determine the validity of the rule.

Next, although the transforms and spreading linears are perpendicular in the open Indian Ocean, they are diagonal to each other in the Gulf of Aden. This can be due again to the Triple Junction effect, where the continent of Africa has interfered with their presentation, but this emphasizes the non-agreement for linears near continents, where Subduction physics overwhelms the presentation of Earth-Moon mechanics influences.


Rifts on Africa are arcuate- producing lakes. They are concave to east, the direction of movement. Rifts connote extension, but could be like trenches which form with collision of seafloor.


The point of reference is the largest body of water: Lake Victoria
West Indies arrays make a case for Comparison for understanding the East Indies.
West Indies Dynamics, as compared to the East Indies

The West Indies may be somewhat simpler than the East, from the standpoint of Subduction and Moving Crust. The immediate comparison is as follows:
Vulcanism occurs inside the arcs, on the concave side of arrays of islands, with apparent direction of subduction being NE-ward for Indonesia and SW-ward for the Antilles;
Both arrays occur at a zone of interference between continents- NA and SA for the West, and Australia and Asia for the East Indies;
Both areas have some stable islands, such as Kalimantan in the east and Cuba in the west;
Both have two separate dynamics occurring- Indian Ocean and Pacific Ocean edge effects for the east, and Atlantic and Pacific Ocean influences for the west; and
Both occurrences lie inside the Tropics.

The main differences include:
1. East Indies lies astraddle the Equator;
East Indies presents Orthogonality, between islands on either side of the Equator (Philippines N-S, vs. Java E-W), whereas the general trend of the West Indies is NE-SW;
2. The West Indies has the major complexity of the Gulf of Mexico lying next door-NW, whereas East Indies has the deepest trench to the NE;
Although the Java trench has the most violent activity (Krakatoa and the larger number of active volcanoes), it is not driving toward a major continent. Conversely, the Antilles and Puerto Rico Trenches lie near and create a SA coastal mountain range; and,
3. Sumatra lies just east of the trace of India traveling toward the Asian continent.
The overall major difference for the two island arrays is that of the conjectured movement of the equatorial bulge (due to a 10 degree or so wandering of the global axis in the last two million years) toward the north and west for the North Pacific. This movement is conjectured to have influenced the anomalous behavior of the entire south and western Pacific region- which would have created the Marianas Trench and the contrast of East Indies array versus the Philippines. This observation is based on the anomalous behavior of the East Indies crossing the Equator, which does not occur for the West Indies.

Restating the major projections:
A. Earth’s polar Axis Wandering has changed approximately 10 degrees in the last 2 million years;
B. Polar Wandering has caused the Moon to attract a region near the Equator towards the north and west of its previous configuration;
C. The re-configuration has created a re-circulation starting at the Challenger Deep (Marianas Trench), which dives toward the mantle;
D. This Bulge re-location occurs only near the present Equator in the region from Fiji to Guam. It apparently does not result in relocations elsewhere, although there are exaggerated transform anomalies between NA and SA (the Romanche Fracture), and along the Galapagos Ridge at the Equator; and,
E. Shrinkage of the Bulge determines transform orientation, while Wandering of the Polar Axis causes re-location of the Bulge. Vulcanism occurs at bulge re-locations, while shear and fracturing occurs at Transform contrasts.

Let's look at the Mid_Atlantic Ridge, where there is massive SHEARING along the Equator.

Shear along the Equator
Transforms near the present Equator show that there is maximum perpendicular displacement of sea bottom, along the transform, at the Romanche Fracture between Africa and S America. Viewing the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, MAR, there is the largest displacement of the MAR spreading center, of about 20 degrees of Longitude at the equator. This represents 1200 nautical miles (∆= 20˚) of shear along the present equator- more than anywhere else along the MAR (compare this displacement with the NP, where the total shear movement is on the order of a few hundred miles- north of the equator). Notice that the MAR is displaced to the west, looking northward, as one looks at the ridge from space. Further north, the displacement along the ridge is only 10 degrees or so, as Iceland is approached. Overall, the appearance is one where the MAR is shaped like the north half of the African coast, whereas south of the equator the MAR is monotonous toward an N-S orientation.


This differential displacement is curious, since it immediately suggests that while the two continents have been pulling apart (more accurately, spreading because of the upwelling of lava- along MAR- causing them to move in opposite directions- Africa to the east), the NW part of Africa has moved relatively less eastwardly than SW Africa. This means that simultaneously with shearing along the equator of the sea bottom, the northern half of Africa has been shearing at the equator also. This could be easily checked by looking at the geological map, to find left-lateral faulting along the zero latitude line. However, this is complicated by the occurrence of the Gulf of Guinea- which obscures bends to the north of the diagnostic Transform lines. It appears that Africa has been divided by sutures which cross Africa all the way to the Gulf of Aden to the triple junction. Possibly Africa has major unconformities between the north and south halves, through the unexplored Sahel. This would have great consequences, because of the potential for petroleum exploration, if so.


Still, what evidence is there more easily seen for shearing, or lateral faulting, across the whole of Africa- near the present Equator?
Rivers tend to drain along weaknesses in the Crust, since water flowing downhill finds the fractures and faults which allow easy erosion. The only rivers showing this weakness are the Congo and its tributaries (Ubangi), and this confirmation is truncated east of the Nile, where N-S landforms and rivers occur. The shape of the Congo is informative, since it does drain westwardly along the equator. Its lower and upper portions are at right angles, hinting that there are major dynamics between the west and east portions of Africa. This is already confirmed by the presence of the circular array of lakes, where rifting occurs near 30 degrees east longitude, and by Indian transforms which influences the triple junction region at Somalia. This should be checked for MAJOR UNCONFORMITIES on geologic maps, but these may occur over wide distances (hundreds of kilometers), and should be investigated kiloscopicly (on a kilometer scale), rather than for simple lateral faulting.
Ι’ll re-introduce my way of looking at the Earth, using different measuring scales:
Microscopic: a treatment of grains, minerals, and pores within a rock sample (practitioners include mineralogists);
Macroscopic: a view of rocks with the eye, as one might look at a hand sample or a well log (well log analysts and petrophysicists);
Kiloscopic: a view of rock, fractures, faulting, and mapping on a kilometer scale (geologists); and
Megascopic: a look at landforms, trends, and basins on a thousand kilometer scale (geomorphologists and myself). Biases will be agreed upon by those within a given category- geologists may curse geophysicists, geochemists may feel put on by all of the others, and those who are holistic will disdain all of the above.


Traces of ancient crustal movements are subtle on Geographical Maps- one must resort to Geologic Mapping to get the story from ROCKS.

Geomorphology vs. Geology on Landforms The North Africa Google photo shows the difficulty of getting geological information from photos. Whereas arrays of islands and transforms-spreading centers are easily seen for orientation on an ocean map (with subduction, and parallel-ness), deciphering events on land is much more difficult. Erosion of anything protruding on land is dominant, as is chemical weathering. Features of similar ages on land compared to those on islands and undersea are changed quickly. Anyone in archeology knows that the bones may be there from just a few thousand years previous, but they are obscured by sedimentation, erosion, weathering, and re-arrangement by Life.


Nevertheless, mounds left from cultures a few thousand years ago still present a portrait for the discerning eye. This is the case for the Sahel (region south of the Sahara), where traces of sutures or faulting may be subtly presented. The Congo basin is one such feature, where it is possible that transforms affected the interior for a few hundred kilometers. Look to the east of the Gulf of Guinea and you will see a trace of a projection of this transform (left-lateral fault) proceeding toward the Ubangi River (a tributary of the Congo) and on to Sudan. Similarly, a trace proceeds from the Gulf of Aden toward Lake Albert and the rift valley in Kenya, but these two discontinuities do not meet. A major geological change occurs between them, and I assume that it is due to the land spreading in the intervening distance. Although West Africa is moving to the east (as noted by the MAR), East Africa is moving to the east faster- causing spreading along the circular array of lakes (Albert to Nyasa). Hands-on geology will have to done on the ground to confirm these hints from traces.


Shear along Transforms in the North Atlantic Ocean
South of the Equator, the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, MAR, traces N-S, indicating regularity- no bulge diminution, no Length of Day- LOD change causing shear, no shifting of the equatorial bulge, or wandering of polar axis. This is the opposite of that in the North Atlantic, where there is a lengthy shift (shear and left-lateral faulting) along the equator, spreading zones fitting the shape of North Africa, occurrence of the Azores Islands, and finally extrusion at Iceland .What’s the difference here- can we explain all this with gravity influences? The ones known include:
Polar Wandering could have caused the previous regime to exhibit a bulge closer to the present North Pole (on the Pacific side, the previous equator would have been south of that presently shown, and on the Atlantic side, north by 10 degrees or so of the present equator).
Should there have been no previous bulge south of the present equator, the transforms there would have been regular. Lack of a bulge would have negated faulting caused by diminution of the bulge in the South Atlantic. This feature might be checked on the islands of St, Helena and Tristan da Cunha. Further, there should be no Latitudinal shear-caused transforms, (no mass differential between latitude lines- hence no Coriolis-like shear between Latitudes.


The bulge-shaped continental portion on the West Africa map is about 30 degrees in latitudinal extent, and the bulge feature shown by transforms is about 40 degrees in extent (approximately the effect shown in the Pacific (about 40 degrees in latitudinal extent). Both of these findings hint that ellipsoidal bulge diminution has added to the shear along transforms, in both of these oceans.
LOD and bulge diminution could have caused orientation of the transforms along latitude lines, but there should be shown some change of curvature or discontinuity along latitude lines caused by the conjectured Wandering of the polar axis (which would possibly be independent of change of LOD and equator bulge height).
Using the calculated shear along the equator- due to slowdown of the bulge caused by tidal friction from the Moon- there are 300 miles of shear for a geological time occurrence of 50 million years. The 20 longitudinal degrees or 1200 nautical miles of Shear shown on the Atlantic seafloor map is significantly greater (than that calculated from LOD increase). There were 24 seconds/million years increased time of LOD (.024 milliseconds/year). The equator moves 15 degrees/hour (24 time zones each day- 360 degree circle, or one time zone each hour- each degree is identified as 60 nautical miles; this yields a velocity at the equator of 900 nautical miles/hour, or .25 miles/second). From LOD increase of 24 seconds each million years, or 6 miles shear along the equator, compared to the non-bulge portion of the earth, this amounts to 300 nautical miles for a cycle of 50 million years of the ocean floor. Consequently shear by bulge diminution and LOD increase may determine the orientation of transforms, but not the bulk of the movement (compare 1200 nautical miles shear along the equator shown on the ocean map to 300 by calculation). The larger part may be due to the Heat Engine producing the Spreading-Subduction Cycle, and this cannot be solved by two-dimensional analysis. Again, the Atlantic Ocean map, similarly to the North Pacific, shows regularity for its Transforms and Spreading Centers, except for the Interferences found at the East and West Indies, whereas those from the Indian Ocean to New Zealand do not.

North Atlantic Anomalies
Notwithstanding all the diatribes about the Atlantic Ocean being regular, when viewed for its transforms and equatorial shifts, there are 2 problems arising on the global map, concerning the Mid-Atlantic Ridge:
1. Iceland, which is just south of the Arctic Circle (65 N, 20 W Longitude) is the only MAR location with a continuous extrusive buildup. Vulcanism erupts there now, and the island does not have a linear track on the ocean floor chain (indicating that it is a stationary lava source) - as does the Hawaiian chain. It is the largest continuously-growing island having active volcanoes. Other sites around the world having vulcanism are either on island arcs, on land, or are much smaller in extent. Iceland has basaltic non-explosive vulcanism, and is opposite from Fiji on the globe. It emits lava from the spreading center which dichotomizes the earth (and which possibly leads to the Aleutian Trench and the Hawaiian-Emperor Chain). Why is this the only oceanic location on the bifurcation which releases basalt on such a massive scale?



2. The Transform and Spreading orthogonals, which show the shape of North Africa’s western coastline, NAWC, by their distribution (similarly to the NAWC), show that lines of emissions are diverted westward on the south of the array (Equator), and diverted eastward on the north side of the array. The presentation is reverse to that in the North Pacific, where it is conjectured that the LOD increase and shrinkage of the equatorial bulge cause a net crustal movement to the east. For NW Africa, the net movement in the past was for the areal bulge to move westward (even while spreading is moving the continent eastward). This effect is such a marked presentation, that it cannot be ignored- the N-S location of the MAR south of the equator being so monotonous compared to the North Atlantic. The Romanche Fracture could be a result of slowing of the earth’s bulge to cause left-lateral faulting, but the bulk of the transform-spreading center array cannot. What is moving the spreading center array to the west, north of the equator- the opposite of the movement of the lands east of the spreading center?
Considering the current earth tectonics theory, not including the possible LOD-transform conjecture, there is no adequate explanation for the fact that the South Atlantic Ocean has monotonous N-S spreading centers, while the North Atlantic has an array parallel to the coast of North Africa (semi-circularly-shaped).


Again, the fact that the shift occurs at the Equator hints that the equatorial bulge is involved. Other circular arrays (Bismarck Archipelago, Nauru, Banda Sea islands, and Galapagos Islands) hint that the equator is important in forming features on the world map throughout geologic time. Factors bearing on this anomaly of the North Africa coastal bulge are:
There are arrays of islands west of the African coast in the north which indicates previous geothermal activity; whereas there is again monotony to the south (exceptions are the islands of St. Helen and Tristan da Cunha, before reaching the Walvis Ridge off South Africa). These significant chains to the north include the Canary, Cape Verde, and Madeira Islands, which indicate previous tectonic activity near the NW coast of Africa;
South of the Cape Verde islands, until the Equator is reached there is a zone of intense shearing (indicated by staggered presentations of spreading centers and transforms). This is the anomalous zone, which does not fit the Diminution of Bulge projections. If we start with MAR north of this anomalous zone, assuming that the 10-20 degree precession of polar axis of a few million years past had not yet occurred, the Azores to Cape Verde interval would appear regular. The intervening arrays of transforms and orthogonals could have been diverted by some additional rotation to start the massive shearing of the interval. By rotating the North Atlantic 10-20 degrees clockwise (caused by righting of the polar axis by the conjectured polar wandering) this would account for the anomalous North Atlantic grip pattern. But then, how about the South Atlantic? It would have had to have been affected by the new precession also. Since the grid lines there are N-S and still regular, they would have had to have been parallel to the South America Coast before precession. This might fit- rotation of both continents could account for the anomalous behavior, and we would only have to look for a mechanism for shear occurrence along the Equator. Viola, for this part!


The shear in MAR is about 15 degrees Latitude in SURFACE extent; NOTE that this is NOT the same as the rotation of 15 degrees (a 3-dimensional effect).

Now we are left with the enigma of all of the conjectured equatorial bulge diminution effects being concentrated in only 15 degrees of the North Atlantic, as compared to 40 degrees in the North Pacific. The Equatorial Bulge should occur in the zone between the 45 N and S latitudes, with the north and south poles being relatively less separated. We have found that re-arrangement of the bulge, so far, is noticed (with unusual vulcanism, circular island arrays, and subduction of ocean floor under other ocean floor) only occurring in the Quadransphere between Indonesia and New Zealand. Now we have a skinnier and narrower zone in the North Atlantic.


The critic might find that we have “laid off” everything not explained by the Earth Tectonics theory onto the Moon and its influence on the Bulge of the Earth. It appears that Equatorial Bulge Diminution occurs (as viewed on a geographical map) only near the Equator for More Stable continents, such as Australia and Africa. Possibly other regions are too deep in the oceans or have not been sorted out from difficult-to-decipher island arrays (such as E. and W. Indies). We await more data and analyses!

Massive shear zones along the Equator (50-60 W. longitude) are aligned on the north side with the northern part of the West Indies volcanic zone. South of this line, the transform grid aligns along Latitude lines, and to the North of W.I. the grid lines turn perpendicular to the N. American coast. This appearance suggests that for West Indies and oceanic islands to the south shear (until reaching the Equator) is related to slowing of the Equatorial Bulge- which affects islands and ocean floor transforms more than for continents.

Subduction is occurring toward the west, relative to the W. Indies (which are moving toward the east), because the equatorial zone west of MAR is moving westward. Also, the zone east of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, MAR, is moving slower than is the spreading at the Rift in Africa- hence Rift lakes occur in E. Africa. The Antilles Islands portray one of the smallest island arcs in the oceans, indicating a shallow subduction. The parallel-ness of the near-equator transforms, versus the perpendicularity (to the NA coastline) of the transforms north of 10 degrees latitude indicate that the more northerly lines were influenced by the Paleozoic subduction towards NA and the ones near the equator were influenced by the later Mesozoic to Recent subduction under the West Indies. The question remains: is this shear caused by relative subduction rates, or is it caused by slowing of the Bulge? One would think that the heat-engine driving subduction would be the more powerful, but if it is, it is confined to a smaller latitude interval than elsewhere on the globe (less than 10 degrees Latitude, compared e.g. to the Kuril Trench of about 20 degrees extent).
The shear north of the equator is left-lateral, which is necessary for this to conform to the diminution of bulge projection. Further, the subduction occurs between two major continents, which could be said to focus the shear into a narrow band of latitude. Island Arcs, active vulcanism on the concave side of the Puerto Rico trench indicate that this is a standard subduction, explained by diving seafloor for everything except that the occurrence lies near the Equator and that the massive shear is oriented E-W.
Let’s look at the movement along the equator in terms of velocity. Take an average rate of movement of the crust of 5 cm/year, and calculate that the time to move the MAR by 35 degrees of longitude, by shear (2100 nautical miles, or 390 million centimeters) is about 78 million years. This places the shear of NW Africa from Northeast S. America at about the time of the Kt meteoric collision (65 m.y.). This event could be expected to have caused a significant polar wandering, which would have re-oriented latitude lines about the new equator. However, this does not account for the projected later polar wandering- expected to have occurred in the Pliocene- unless The Pliocene event simply created a much faster shear rate along the Equator. The latest and most continuous portion of the shear occurred over a 20 degree longitude (the last shear before reaching W. Africa). If it assumed that a 10 cm/year shear velocity occurred over this 1200 nautical miles, or 222 million cm, the time of shear would be 22 m.y.(Miocene). This is larger than 2 m.y. (the conjectured time of onset of the latest precession) by an order of magnitude. It is unlikely that disturbances in the Pliocene effected a larger polar wandering than the notorious Kt event of late Cretaceous. However, some finding of a 35 m.y. meteoric strike has been found in E. USA lately. We must find some polar wandering event-like a meteoric strike- which left evidence on the surface in Pliocene or Pleistocene rocks.
My assessment of all this is that shear caused by equatorial bulge diminution operates mainly on oceanic crust, so that the effect is displayed for the eastern Pacific and now the West Indies- both of which display eastward shear, relatively, along the Equator. It’s as if the Mantle (which after all has much the greater mass than the Crust) is the underlying entity moving in respect to the earth (slowing with Moon’s Drag) and creating the E-W shear. The continents display hardly any of this; hence NA and SA act as a buffer, focusing what little shear occurs into the narrow zone of the West Indies. In the open Pacific Ocean there is no interference from continents, and the equatorial zone can move freely to the east- as do the Antilles relatively,
But what about the SAR, which displays none of the Moon’s drag onto the positioning of the SAR? It appears that SA acts as a shield to the influence of the Moon’ drag,- displaying only a Polar Axis rotation away from the SAR (clockwise). The SAR displays a N-S trend monotonously through the total zone east of SA and south of he Equator. Note that this incipience is earlier than Tertiary.

Enigma of the Half-World Spreading Centers While the Pacific floor is surrounded by the Ring of Fire, it nevertheless exhibits a major Spreading Center on its east side- called the East Pacific Rise, EPR. This is part of another phenomenon- spreading or rifting- which occurs in greatest measure in the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, extending from north of Iceland to the South Atlantic (probably terminated by the track of India, known as the SW Indian Ridge). There are other rifts or ridges occurring about the world, all of which tend to orient N-S (within 45 degrees or so) in many parts of the Globe. If they extend to the Poles, they are obscured by Antarctica land mass or Arctic ice. They tend to occur between 110 W and 140 E, south of Australia- over more than half of the globe. Since they are so ubiquitous, they must be part of the system of global crustal re-circulation.
Although the spreading centers or rifts must constitute a 3-dimensional system, extending into the Mantle, we will investigate whether they have some gravity component (such as Moon Tide or LOD influence). We can visualize them as ripening orange fruit, which has repercussions to the bursting side on the opposite side of the fruit- causing strains on the borders of the unbroken rind. The opposite side would have mechanical strains such as buckles- equivalent to the subduction under the rind of the orange (diving of seafloor under the continents). With this analogy, when the fruit opens on one side, due to it being part of a ball, something must react on the opposing side of the mono-pith. Possibly this is part of the global Mantle excitations, which exerts influence on such entities as the Linear Chain “Hotspots”, Iceland’s stationary extrusions, diving of ocean crust under itself, and the “Ring of Fire”.
Earth Tectonics Scientists will probably proclaim that reconstructions of aggregations of the continents throughout time show that orientations of continents and their linears are somewhat random and merely fortuitous that they just now exhibit transform grids and their orthogonals in N-S or E-W patterns. My reply to this is that we are investigating mechanics which are occurring NOW, and previous exhibits of the Crustal-Mantle movements happened when other effects were underway. Collisions from Space, interaction with the Moon, and Oceanic-Atmospheric circulations were different in the past, so that circumstances before the Tertiary may have created an entirely environment (hence putting randomness in the minds of Geologists).
Wandering of the Previous North Pole (Conjectured)
It appears likely that the Polar Axis has shifted within the last Epoch- since the Pliocene. Although there seems to be no present Geological evidence for this shift, we will proceed with the assumption that hints shown by the Lack of transforms in the North Pacific, south of Gulf of Alaska- versus a proliferation in the South Atlantic, similarly a lack of transforms at the opposite location at 20 E longitude, near Antarctica, creation of anomalies in the South Pacific Ocean to Guam (a bulge-shift created by the polar shift), and an overlay of transform grids obscuring older ones with a 20 degree shift in orientation all yield strong hints that polar wandering has left its mark on oceanic ridges and islands.
Polar Axis shift of 15 degrees or so will have left its mark on the Arctic Ocean seafloor also. The evidence is shown by the Google Photo of the seafloor, that the Chukchi Plateau north of Alaska would have been the location of the Pole- for an 18 degree movement. Polar wandering would be caused by an impact, either from outer space or from collision of plates, so that the Mechanical Equilibrium of the spinning Earth was disturbed. The previous study of Google Photos of the Ocean Basins and continental mapping has shown that the following features indicate a polar wandering within the last 2 million years:
1.The orientation of the Hawaiian Chain has moved from roughly NW-SE closer to N-S, since the formation of Maui (2 m.y. ago);
2. Many sets of NW-SE fracture sets have been overlain by N-S sets in my area of study in Verde Valley, AZ limestone (< 5 m.y. in Verde limestone- Tv);
3. The Hurricane Fault, Hf, has rejuvenated its upward movement in a N-S orientation in the Pleistocene;
4. Mammoth Lakes geothermal area has youngest orientation of hot springs, vulcanism, and fracturing in a N-S orientation, versus NW-SE just to the west in older uplifts (Sierras); and,
5. Presentation of the Cascades has an N-S orientation, versus older expressions NW-SE (Rockies and Vancouver Island).
The orientation of many Basin and Range, B&R, features is N-S also, but these may be Miocene in origin (as is much of the extensional volcanics and geothermal expressions of the West USA).
Below is shown the projected previous North Pole, so that we can relate anomalies there to what is already known:



Polar Axis Wandering versus Precession in Space
There is the Nagging Question, when you look at all of the Google Photos: Never mind the diatribes about Wobbling, Precession, increase in LOD, Equatorial Bulge shrinkage, and shifting of the location of the Bulge about the Equator- how is it that with all this, the Grids of Transforms in the tropics of the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans remain remarkably persistently E-W in orientation, showing no significant variation?
Were there to be Polar Axis wandering, the Grids would wander also (the Earth would be spinning about a new axis). There is the exception of the grids re-orienting in the North Atlantic, which show clearly that the older portion, near the North American coast, are perpendicular to the coastline, and we know that to be due to the impact of plates in the late Paleozoic. After that time, in the Mesozoic, Grids are excellent for gauging movements along the Equator. Rotation of continents, e.g. South America- with about a 15 degrees movement (shown by the angle between the SAR spreading zone and the coastline) can be dated to Mesozoic, and Geologists think they have found a splitting of the ancient crust at about this time. Rotation of continents, relative to each other, is the result of relative movements of the Crust and not to Precession.
The geographical data are giving the answer- Precession is in relation to space, where the Axis of rotation may remain the same, while precession varies. Remember the spinning top: It maintained its spinning axis, but in relation to the air in which it spins, it precessed and wobbled. To cause the Earth’s Axis to move (displaying the North Pole in a different geographic location), the mass distribution in the Earth must move relative to the Globe. The split of the agglomerated Crust into many parts (continents) can be caused by an attempt of a spinning Ball to right itself with respect to the center of mass- its tilt with respect to itself would vary. I cannot determine, looking at a two-dimensional map, whether this is due to the Core or the Mantle. But the Crust of the Earth is an insignificant amount of the mass being re-distributed. Hence, the observation that the continents appear more receptive to analysis, compared to continents, is telling us that the mantle re-distribution is more easily reflected in thin Oceanic Crust than for thick crust below continents. Precession in Space can occur when there is no re-orientation of the Polar Axis. The main change noticed would be the relocations of the Tropics of Cancer and Capricorn.
The result of all this is that when we see an entity such as re-orientation of the Hawaiian Chain from NW-SE closer to N-S, this is not due to Spatial Precession, but to change of stress direction in the Pacific floor. This is a mass re-distribution effect (possibly due to Core-Mantle movements), which changes the stress system across portions of the Crust.

Let’s now look at all of the preceding analyses with a new eye.
Rotation of continents and varying angles of Transform Grid lines will be due to re-distributions of mass in times earlier than Tertiary. This will allow us to discard transforms which are not oriented in the current E-W system, since they will belong to previous Geologic eras. Tertiary lengthening of LOD and movements of the Equatorial Bulge will not result from Spatial Precession, but will yield vertical movement of Crust- which are slight (the Hurricane fault dropped some few hundred meters in the last million years), or will yield shear of the Crust along NW-SE linears (or their orthogonals). It is possible that re-orientation in the late Pliocene is very dificult to see from present maps, due to such slow changes occurring in the orientation of continents.
With this new assistance, we can now see that the West Indies Bulge toward the east is not a Tertiary-initiated event (although it certainly continues now), and that the drastic shear to the East from the Puerto Rico trench was caused by a mass movement in the Mantle (3D) or Core- whose orientation is dominated by the present Equatorial shear (not Spatial precession, relative to the SUN). We are off the hook- we can have shrinking of the Equatorial Bulge, shear along grid lines, and re-location of the Bulge with or without significant Precession! Further, Polar Wandering can be completely independent of Precession- it will be created by re-distribution of Mass within the Earth. Polar Wandering can accompany tectonic movements, and might be slightly correlated with Bulge movements- down or laterally.
Reviewing,
1. Polar Wandering, due to re-distribution of mass within the Earth occurs mainly in the Mantle and Core, and shows up best in Ocean Basins (due to the thinner crust, while continents with thicker crust obscure the display);
2. LOD increases occur due to Moon-Earth tidal action, causing slowing of Equatorial velocity and shear along latitude lines where Bulge is prominent:
3. Movement of the Equator, due to Polar Wandering, causes shifting of the bulge as the Moon attracts the region of the relocated bulge; and
4. Polar Wandering can be almost independent of LOD and Bulge re-locations, since the 20 miles or so of Crust differential is insignificant compared to mass of Mantle or Core.

Iceland “Hotspot”
Iceland is different compared to all of the other Spreading Center Extrusions, in that it leaves no transform Grid Lines nearby. It is also the largest of the Basalt Piles created by emission from below. Whereas elsewhere the spreading center moves its east and west scarps apart with time, Iceland appears to remain stationary. However, it does appear to be the location of a discontinuity in the Earth’s behavior. South of Iceland, gridlines are perpendicular to North America, while to the north they are perpendicular to Scandinavia- indicating a drastic Polar Wandering. In other words, a major tear or schism in the Crust or Mantle below Iceland may allow continuous flow of Lava from the Mantle.


Time of initiation of the Icelandic flow
Should the globe have effected a movement of the Poles, it would have had to have been coincident with the shearing of Europe from America in late Paleozoic. This could have happened because of the instability of a crust which was largely located in one portion of the globe. However, remember that the Crust is a minor part of the Earth, and that likely the underlying Mantle (with its much larger Mass) was unstable. This could have occurred because of several factors:
1. The center of mass of the earth could have shifted (because of an impact from Space, or from density changes in the earth- caused by mineralogical phase separations, or from a thickening Crust). At any rate, there was a massive die-off of Life, at the end of the Paleozoic- indicating a dramatic Climate Change. The fact that Gridlines appear on the ocean floor north of Iceland (and other features- such as tropical life indications in fossils), hints that Iceland was near the Tropics. Today it is near the Arctic Circle;
2. The Crust could have become more significant as it increased in thickness with time- caused by Life attacking extrusives and converting them to sediments which recycle into granite-like crust. This increased mass of the Crust- although lighter in density- would have been extended the diameter of the Earth because of Isostasy. The end result is a globe which extends into space by a few more miles. This is not the same as the Equatorial Bulge, but the combination of the Tides and irregularly distributed crustal mass would have created an instability, causing the spinning Earth to rearrange its contents. This would be the time of the Indian Subcontinent to have spun off from its near-Antarctic location and its movement towards a location of lesser crustal mass (Indian Ocean). Its continual compression doesn’t bode well for this projection! However, this conjecture, based upon the difference between continents and seafloor, accentuates a feature which may have been forgotten, Continents appear to be independent of ocean floor, in how they grossly portray grid lines. Ones I have studied present two patterns of fractures on land- NW-SE and N-S, whereas the seafloor mainly presents orthogonal patterns. The whole Western USA presents extrusion sites on this same NW-SE or N-S system.
3. Was the Polar Wandering due to a precessional effect or to an internal mass re-distribution? This would be a partial answer to the shifting of continents. True precession, due to a change in the angle of the tilt of the polar axis to the plane of the Ecliptic (presently 23+ degrees), causes a change of climate- due to the angle of sunlight, but it would indirectly influence the Equatorial Bulge. As the Earth changes its inclination to the Sun, referenced the Moon, the tidal effect and bulge is attracted to the Moon differently. The Moon begins to move the bulge laterally. I assume that this is happening in the Western and Southern Pacific now, and if correct, shows how some islands and shear zones are initiated. Lastly,
4. As Mantle converts to Crust, by the effect of Life taking out the elements such as K, which it puts in the hydrosphere, the thickness of the mantle decreases. This would not appear to be significant, but it shifts mass into the Crust- which becomes unstable and operates somewhat independently of the Mantle (hence the continents wander about, becoming more and more free of the Mantle). Notice that this happens after there was significant mass of Life and its fossils, when there begins to be a dramatic increase in thickness of Crust. This fact of Life- having its own agenda- is curious, since it appears that Man is acting similarly now (it would appear to be violating the Laws of Thermodynamics, in hastening its own demise).

GPS-Indications showing Crustal Movements
My intention for this three-month exercise has been to show an analysis of Earth movements which are found on simple Geographic and Google Earth maps. To eliminate all bias except my own, I have not read many Geological treatises or Professional Papers, so that I would not incorporate others’ biases. I have observed in the past that errors in findings , or erroneous conclusions, are frequently carried forward by researchers, and that outsiders may find these mistakes- since they are not subject to Cultural or Fashionable group-think..
Now that my analysis is essentially complete, I will augment it with reports from insiders. I will add internet links shown at the beginning of the report, which show present thinking. Now, I may find that I have missed something of importance, but at least any error will be my own. If I have omitted something of value, I will now add that to comments.
The first independent set of measurements is shown below, in the photo of GPS data for present movements of the Crust, from many stations around the World:



NASA data from GPS show arrows which indicate present Crustal movement directions and relative magnitudes.

This photo shows many general Features, particularly of Contrasts:
1. Shear is shown at the areas I have found from Transform Maps- that of Equatorial Regions of Pacific Ocean near New Guinea and the Atlantic-Caribbean West Indies. These are found by the contrast of movement vectors, as shown by arrows which are orthogonal to others nearby;
2. The pattern of Australia fits with the hemispherical movement, and doesn’t appear anomalous, but it doesn’t fit with its Indonesian and New Zealand neighbors;
There appear to be two contrasting world-wide circular movements- the CW circulation for Africa-Asia-Europe continents, and CCW circulation for N. and S. America (with shear indicated for the SA north coast);
3. The two cells of circulation, when allowing for longitude, are mirror images of each other- that is, the whole global Crust seems to be circulating between Crust and Mantle, beneath the Equator, when looking only at the total globe (except for Antarctica);
4. Exceptions to the above generalizations occur at Ascension and Easter Islands, Guam and the entire Pacific plate, and the Indonesian Islands; and,
Overall, it appears that the “Ring of Fire” has an opening on the south or west side, where Australia is moving in to create a new Equatorial Bulge, where ocean floor existed previously (while the Pacific plate is being displaced to the north).
From a gross standpoint, the entire Pacific plate from West USA to Australia and Indonesia is anomalous. The rest of the Crust fits in with the idea of a great circulating cell, rotating under the Equator (south for the Continental Crustal part, north for the Mantle, under seafloor). The Crust is diving under the northern continents, while Australia is rushing in to fill the void near the Equator being vacated. Try FOLDING the map at the 160th Longitude in your mind's eye, to see how the arrows making the circular pattern align with those on the corresponding (other) side of the map.
Antarctica does not have sufficient data to check for fit with this theorem.




Questions remaining, after Modeling Transforms for Ocean Basins At least two categories of activities are impinging upon the dynamic Earth- which are largely independent of each other:
The Moon and its earth tides are continually interacting with the Earth, shaping the equatorial bulge and fatiguing the brittle rocks of the Crust. This must be sorted out from those entities created by Heat of Radioactive decay, friction, crystalline change, and circulatory cells as they rotate with time. The affect of the Moon upon the Pacific Basin and the southern part of the Atlantic Basin seems clear, but the appearance of the interaction of the West Indies with the westward-moving Atlantic Plate creates a zone along the Equator which is not understood as to cause. This is the large shear zone from Africa to the northern coast of South America, which is the largest in lateral extent seen for the whole Globe. It indicates a crustal movement opposite to that seen in the Eastern Pacific- westward (while the West Indies moves relatively eastward). Whereas the net movement of the Pacific Basin near the Equator is eastward over a large range of Latitudes, the shear along the Equator for the Atlantic is concentrated over a narrow band of Latitude- going westward, separating the Africa and SA continents through Geologic Time.
The question is: What is effecting such a continuous (over time) change over such a narrow Latitude band, while the North Atlantic has created a bulge in the spreading center line from the Equator until Iceland (somewhat concentric with the west coast of Africa)?There are a number of unexplained anomalies on the Globe, which do not fit with the current Plate Tectonics Theory:
Iceland, which is a stationary extrusion site on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge (spreading center);
Marianas Trench, which is an open-ocean line of diving seafloor (descending under ocean floor of similar density); and
Indian Subcontinent and Australia, which are both moving northward at apparently greater than normal velocities.
All of the categories above evidently occur under the impetus of Heat Engines, and are not created by the Mechanics system of Tides, Equatorial bulge, LOD, and Earth-Moon interaction.

These questions will be deferred to a following section for possible incorporation with other Transform categorizations.

To be continued in the January 2009 analysis: see later discussion.