Age progressive volcanism in the Comores Archipelago and Northern Madagascar

The Comores islands and Tertiary volcanic province of Northern Madagascar form a sub-linear trend of alkalic shield volvanoes across the northern Mozambique Channel. Potassium-argon dating of shield building lavas confirms an eastward increase in age of volcanism along the chain, consistent with a hotspot origin for the lineament. The rate of migration of the Somali Plate over the mantle source is approximately 45 mm/yr. This new geochronology for the Comores island chain is used to model the absolute motion of the Somali Plate for the last 10 million years. A systematic departure of the Somali Plate absolute motion from the African Plate absolute motion during this period represents a component of relative motion across the East African Rift at the rate of .330 deg/m.y., about an Euler pole located at 63.6 deg. S,2.3. deg. E. The geometry of older portions of the Comores and Reunion trends indicates that there was no significant relative motion between the African and Somali Plates prior to about 10 m.y. ago. Sequential reconstructions from 200-0 m.y. are presented.