The Çınarcık Basin is a submarine
tectonic basin
A structural basin is a large-scale structural formation of rock strata formed by tectonic warping of previously flat-lying strata. They are geological depressions, the inverse of domes. Elongated structural basins are also known as synclines. ...
located in the
Sea of Marmara
The Sea of Marmara,; grc, Προποντίς, Προποντίδα, Propontís, Propontída also known as the Marmara Sea, is an inland sea located entirely within the borders of Turkey. It connects the Black Sea to the Aegean Sea via the ...
, in Turkey.
Geography
The Çınarcık basin gets its name from
Çınarcık
Çınarcık is a town and district of Yalova Province in the Marmara region of Turkey. The mayor is Numan Soyer. (AK Party).
Çınarcık has a permanent population of 18,000 but its location near İstanbul has made it a popular location for s ...
, a town and district of the
Yalova Province
Yalova Province ( tr, ) is a province in northwestern Turkey, on the eastern coast of the Sea of Marmara. Its adjacent provinces are Bursa to the south and Kocaeli to the east. The population of the Yalova Province was 203,741 in 2010. Prior ...
in the Marmara region of Turkey. It is the easternmost of the three basins which run in direction EW in the sea, the other two being (from E to W) the central basin and the Tekirdağ basin.
Its maximum depth amounts to 1,276 m.
Geology
The Çınarcık Basin is a
transtensional basin which runs along the
Princes' Islands
The Princes' Islands ( tr, Prens Adaları; the word "princes" is plural, because the name means "Islands of the Princes", el, Πριγκηπονήσια, ''Pringiponisia''), officially just Adalar ( en, Islands); alternatively the Princes' Arch ...
segment of the northern branch of the
North Anatolian Fault
The North Anatolian Fault (NAF) ( tr, Kuzey Anadolu Fay Hattı) is an active right-lateral strike-slip fault in northern Anatolia, and is the transform boundary between the Eurasian Plate and the Anatolian Plate. The fault extends westward fro ...
(NAF).
However, in correspondence with the basin there is no evidence of a single
strike-slip Fault
In geology, a fault is a planar fracture or discontinuity in a volume of rock across which there has been significant displacement as a result of rock-mass movements. Large faults within Earth's crust result from the action of plate tecton ...
, neither is visible a cross-basin fault or a pure strike-slip fault in correspondence of the northern margin;
along the southern and northern edges seismic imaging shows many deep-penetrating faults.
The basin hosted the nucleation points of many among the strongest
earthquake
An earthquake (also known as a quake, tremor or temblor) is the shaking of the surface of the Earth resulting from a sudden release of energy in the Earth's lithosphere that creates seismic waves. Earthquakes can range in intensity, from ...
s of the region, like those
of 1509 and
of 1766, and is expected to host the
epicenter
The epicenter, epicentre () or epicentrum in seismology is the point on the Earth's surface directly above a hypocenter or focus, the point where an earthquake or an underground explosion originates.
Surface damage
Before the instrumental pe ...
of the next large earthquake that will hit Istanbul.
Notes
{{marine-geo-stub
Sea of Marmara