Oblique plate collision and orogenic translation of the Southern Apennines revealed by post-Messinian interregional unconformities in the Bradano Basin (Ionian Sea - Central Mediterranean)

The Bradano Basin is a foreland basin along the Africa/Eurasia plate boundary. Due to its location and physiography, between Southern Apennines (SA) and Calabrian Arc (CA), it represents a natural recorder of Plio-Pleistocene tectonic processes. Integrated analysis of seismic reflection data, exploration well logs and seafloor bathymetry allowed us to unravel the basin architecture and the interplay between tectonics and sedimentation, providing stratigraphic and structural evidences on deep processes and shallow morpho-structural development. It results, that the post-Messinian tectonic evolution on this area is marked by two major tectonic events, whose effects are recorded in four sedimentary sequences bounded by interregional unconformities. During Pliocene times, an obliquely convergent margin led to collision between SA and CA, associated with shelf to deep marine turbiditic deposits. Around the Pliocene-Pleistocene boundary (2.58 Ma), a sudden and widespread rearrangement took place. The SA front, along with portions of the earlier obliquely collisional margin, started to move toward the NE, along progressively deeper detachments involving the lower Apulia plate. During this phase, a fast (3.8–8.3 cm/yr) ~50 km translation of the orogenic wedge was followed by uplift and slow-rate shortening (1.9 mm/year), associated with seafloor folding. This second phase is marked by deep marine deposits in the central part of the basin, and clinoforms in shallower western and northern sectors. Our data suggest that no oceanic crust is presently subducting below the Bradano Basin, although we cannot exclude that a narrow sliver of oceanic lithosphere was subducted before and/or during Pliocene times. The complex deformation pattern observed, represents the response to the interaction of (small-) plates, which is still active and important to be considered in neotectonics and paleoseismological reconstructions.