INSPIRE: Chile Margin 2012

Mission Summary

Jolted by the planet's biggest earthquakes, sequestering massive reservoirs of methane, while slowly swallowing a mid-ocean ridge, the Chilean margin offers an inspiring natural laboratory for investigating the complex interactions among the solid earth, the deep ocean, and the biosphere. At the Chile Triple Junction (CTJ), where the South Chile rise (a ridge crest) is being forced under the methane-rich South American continent, an international team of scientists explored for tectonically controlled hydrothermal vents, for seep sites of where methane is released, and for novel "hybrid" systems that may have yielded hot seeps or cool vents.