VOLUME XXX NUMBER 2 



THE 



JOURNAL OF GEOLOGY 



February-March ig22 



THE GREAT FAULT TROUGHS OF THE ANTILLES^ 



STEPHEN TABER 

 University of South Carolina, Columbia, S. C. 



INTRODUCTION 



The region of the Greater Antilles is characterized by a marked 

 elongation of the principal geographic features in an east-west 

 direction and by extremely high rehef (Plate I) . The highest point 

 above sea-level, Mount Tina on the island of Haiti, has an eleva- 

 tion of over 3,100 m. while the deepest sounding in the Atlantic 

 Ocean (8,526 m,) was obtained only 320 km. to the northeast.^ 

 The Antillean mountain ranges are among the most precipitous in 

 the world, but their slopes are, in large part, submerged beneath 

 the surface of the Atlantic Ocean and Caribbean Sea. Off the 

 north coast of St. Croix the descent is 4,348 m. in a distance of 

 8 km., and for shorter distances the slopes are very much steeper. 



The physiography of the Greater Antilles is very complex and 

 as yet little of the region has been studied in detail. The dominant 

 tectonic trend is approximately east and west along arcs convex 

 toward the north, in part following the margins of the great trough- 

 like depressions which are such a striking characteristic of the 



' Presented in part at the Chicago meeting of the Geological Society of America, 

 December, 1920. 



2 All elevations and soundings have been taken from the maps of the Hydrographic 

 Office of the United States Navy. 



