High-intensity geomagnetic field 'spike' observed at ca. 3000 cal BP in Texas, USA

The palaeomagnetic samples yielded high-quality vectors. An age model for the sequence, determined using 15 AMS 14C-dates on individual bones from microvertebrates, was combined with the palaeomagnetic data to construct a secular variation record. The record is in broad agreement with predictions by Holocene field models for the site's location. However, starting ca. 3000 yr ago, the RPI data indicate an almost four-fold increase in geomagnetic field intensity lasting several hundred years. This record presents well-dated evidence, obtained using conventional techniques, for the existence of a geomagnetic intensity spike in North America that is contemporaneous with the shorter duration, decadal-scale spikes reported from the Near East.