What type of plate boundary is the North American Plate and the Caribbean Plate?

What type of plate boundary is the North American Plate and the Caribbean Plate?

Transform
Oceanic Transform—Caribbean Region On the east, the North American Plate is subducting westward, forming volcanoes of the Lesser Antilles Island Arc. Transform boundaries occur on the north and south sides of the Caribbean Plate.

What is the plate boundary between Caribbean and North American meet?

[1] The Polochic-Motagua fault systems (PMFS) are part of the sinistral transform boundary between the North American and Caribbean plates.

What is the relative motion of the Caribbean Plate and the North American Plate?

The approximately 80 million year old Caribbean Plate is roughly rectangular, and it slides eastward at about two centimeters/year relative to the North American Plate.

What type of plate boundary formed the Caribbean islands?

The northern boundary with the North American Plate is a transform or strike-slip boundary which runs from the border area of Belize, Guatemala (Motagua Fault), and Honduras in Central America, eastward through the Cayman trough along the Swan Islands Transform Fault before joining the southern boundary of the Gonâve …

What type of boundary is the North American Plate?

The boundary between the North America Plate and the Eurasian Plate is an example of a divergent boundary at a mid-ocean ridge. All of the plate boundaries that occur down the center of the Atlantic Ocean are divergent boundaries that follow the crest of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge.

Where is the North American tectonic plate located?

North American, we inhabit what is appropriately named the North American Plate, the tectonic boundary that covers most of North America, Greenland, Cuba, Bahamas, and parts of Siberia and Iceland. It extends eastward to the Mid-Atlantic Ridge and westward to the Chersky Range in eastern Siberia.

What type of boundary is the North American plate?

What type of plate is the North American plate?

continental plate plate is exemplified by the North American Plate, which includes North America as well as the oceanic crust between it and a portion of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge.

Where is the Caribbean boundary?

This boundary extends from the border area of Belize, Guatemala and Honduras to the Cayman trough, southeast of Cuba then North of Hispaniola and Puerto Rico. The Eastern boundary is a subduction zone, where the North and South American plate is subducting under the oceanic Caribbean plate.

What kind of motion does a plate boundary have?

Motion along its northern boundary (in the plate boundary zone region) is dominantly strike-slip (sideways motion between the plates), with a small component of subduction (one plate sinks under the other plate).

Which is an example of a convergent plate boundary?

The Pacific Ring of Fire is an example of a convergent plate boundary. At convergent plate boundaries, oceanic crust is often forced down into the mantle where it begins to melt. Magma rises into and through the other plate, solidifying into granite, the rock that makes up the continents.

Where are Puerto Rico and Hispaniola located on the plate?

Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands to its east, and eastern Hispaniola to its west, are located on an active plate boundary zone between the North American Plate and the northeast corner of the Caribbean Plate (Figure 1).

What happens when two tectonic plates move away from each other?

A divergent boundary occurs when two tectonic plates move away from each other. Along these boundaries, earthquakes are common and magma (molten rock) rises from the Earth’s mantle to the surface, solidifying to create new oceanic crust. When two plates come together, it is known as a convergent boundary.