Double-saloon-door tectonics in the North Fiji Basin

- A revised model is presented for North Fiji Basin tectonic development.
- The model includes documented opposite rotations of Vanuatu Arc and Fiji Platform.
- Previous models are incompatible with these terrane rotations.
- Many North Fiji Basin features match double saloon door tectonics.

Fiji Platform rotated counter clockwise from at least 10.2 Ma until 1.56 Ma, while Vanuatu Arc rotated clockwise from 12/10 Ma until the present. A revised model incorporating these opposite rotations explains the distribution of magnetic anomalies in the North Fiji Basin (NFB). The conjugate margin of southwest Fiji Platform is southeast Vanuatu Arc. Previous models which associate NW-oriented anomalies off southwest Fiji with similarly oriented anomalies northeast of Vanuatu Arc are therefore wrong. Secondly, these models propose a NW-oriented spreading ridge extending to 19°S, 177.5°E, almost 500 km southeast of the mapped extension of rifted island-arc crust on Vanuatu Arc. This creates an unacceptable overlap with Fiji Platform in pre-rift reconstructions. Thirdly, anomalies off SW Fiji which are NW-oriented in their present-day position were oriented NNE during initial breakup. Rather than aligning with NW-oriented anomalies in the western NFB, they are matched by NNE-oriented anomalies off SE Vanuatu Arc. With further rotation, these conjugate anomaly sets form a fan shape in the southern NFB. Fourthly, previous models which recognise a triple junction only from 3 Ma do not explain early WNW-ESE separation of Vanuatu Arc and Fiji Platform required by well-documented opposite rotations. NFB characteristics which match the double-saloon-door tectonic model include opposite rotations of island arc terranes, backarc seafloor spreading which is both arc-parallel and arc-perpendicular, and rifts propagating north, south, northeast and northwest. Features which do not match the double-saloon-door model include the North Fiji Fracture Zone and the West Fiji spreading centre. Both initiated post-1.5 Ma, when Fiji Platform stopped rotating, and only one terrane, Vanuatu Arc, continued to rotate. The NFB developed via double saloon door tectonics from 12/10 Ma until 1.5 Ma, whereas post-1.5 Ma opening constitutes single saloon door rotation.