<p>If I look at Google Earth imagery, it is not just the Hawaii Emperor Seamount Chain, but also those of Louisville Hotspot Chain and Society or Pitcairn Hotspot Chains show a slight bend , the Louisville Chain shows a more 'graceful' bend like a gradual 30° bend and Society or Pitcairn somewhere like 40° bend and the Hawaii emperor seamount chain shows a more abrupt bend - like almost 60°. This I suspect could be due to relative changes in the expansion rate of  the southernmost (Pact plate+ Antarctic Plate) and eastern sections (Pac Plate+Nazca) of the East Pacific rise after disappearance of the former Phoenix plate (underneath East Antarctica) , as well as a failure of the Indo Australian ridge spreading at 90 East ridge somewhere 45 to 43 Mya, after which Australia started moving northward instead of Eastward so the vector product of the 2 plate motions now has a different direction which has direct bearing on the hotspot track vector.</p>
<p>The northern segment of Farallon Plate has subducted under North America , and the oldest remnants of Emperor Hotspot track are undergoing flat slab subduction at the cusp of Aleutian and Kuril Kamchatka trenches in the vicinity of Kommandor and Attu Island - this accounts for the cessation or relative 'inactivity' of volcanism in this segment of the otherwise volatile Pacific ring of fire as less seepage of ocean water into trench and formation of accretionary prism from the volcanic rocks on track guyots.</p>
<p>Consider that in the absence of West to East stresses from the breakup of Indo-Australian plate over the East west spreading 90 East ridge , the Galapagos rise E-W spreading center in the Pacific is able to make its impact felt on the E-W spreading direction and the resultant vector product of pacific plate movement is now oriented in a east-north easterly direction instead of being north by north east directed and no longer driven exclusively from the pacific antarctic ridge  . The impact of this is attenuated the further south you get so Louisville hotspot chain is less impacted , but nevertheless shows a bend .</p>
<p>Contrary to the mainstream thought, subduction does not drive plate tectonics, rather its seafloor spreading or rifting that does. Subduction is just a terminal effect of forces acting from the spreading centre. Mantle Current intensity at spreading ridges drives subduction at distal ends .  Another thing I strongly suspect is that modern East And West Antarctica were different continental cratons that fused after a small ocean that separated them closed and this suture is now marked by the Mid Antarctic mountain system. In fact a total ice melt of Antarctica may still reveal a tiny oceanic waterway remnant. So it is highly likely the seafloor spread rate between Pacific and Nazca plates increased substantially after 45 - 40 Mya.</p>
<p>Primary Ref :
<a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/ncomms15660" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Torsvik, T., Doubrovine, P., Steinberger, B. et al. Pacific plate motion change caused the Hawaiian-Emperor Bend. Nat Commun 8, 15660 (2017).</a></p>
<p><a href="https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&amp;rct=j&amp;q=&amp;esrc=s&amp;source=web&amp;cd=&amp;ved=2ahUKEwi1gOiblvvvAhXSGs0KHRtzA34QFjACegQIBBAD&amp;url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.earthdynamics.org%2Fsteinberger%2Fpapers%2Fi0091-7613-35-5-407.pdf&amp;usg=AOvVaw3xndyiSein-bxcRHKJqhL6" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Plate-tectonic reconstructions predict part of the Hawaiian hotspot
track to be preserved in the Bering Sea
Bernhard Steinberger; Carmen Gaina :
Center for Geodynamics, Geological Survey of Norway, Leiv Eirikssons vei 39,N-7491 Trondheim, Norway </a></p>
<p>And more useful background info here on Panthalassa.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/ngeo1401" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Intra-Panthalassa Ocean subduction zones revealed by fossil arcs and mantle structure</a></p>
<p><a href="https://arstechnica.com/science/2012/03/before-the-pacific-putting-ancient-islands-back-on-the-map/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Before the Pacific: finding the lost islands of a Pangea-era ocean</a></p>
<p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ninety_East_Ridge" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Ninety East ridge-Wiki</a></p>
<p><a href="http://drs.nio.org/drs/bitstream/handle/2264/3723/Geophys_Res_Lett_37_L17304a.pdf;jsessionid=461CB977F758BA6481C26138CB4EA5FD?sequence=1" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Sager, W. W.; Paul, C.F.; Krishna, K.S.; Pringle, M.S.; Eisin, A.E.; Frey, F.A.; Rao, D.G.; Levchenko, O.V. (September 2010). &quot;Large fault fabric of the Ninetyeast Ridge implies near-spreading ridge formation&quot; (PDF).</a></p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2020-05-05T04:00:24.880Z
2021-04-13T12:09:34.903Z
2021-04-13T12:09:34.903Z
ArrowB
<p>At the time the bend occurred, the earth had a different angle of rotation. Look east of NZ, follow faults in the floor of the pacific and other places, seamount chains etc. Think extinction times, biblical reference to the sun stopping or going backward etc. Whether the result of an asteroid strike, or just a rotational wobble, it explains a lot. The Emporer chain, much of which has now gone under, shows the original line of rotation. The Hawaiian chain the new angle of rotation.</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2019-04-10T13:09:03.507Z
[Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sagan_standard)
Jan Doggen
CC BY-SA 4.0
2019-05-04T11:19:52.877Z
The end happened tens of millions of years ago.  Humanity came on the scene within the past few hundred thousand years.  The bible is about 2,700 years ago.  It seems, to say the least, unlikely that the bible can provide any hints or clues as to the cause of the bend in the Emperor/Hawaii chain.
Alistair Riddoch
CC BY-SA 4.0
2022-01-20T22:32:13.413Z
A change in the angle of earth's rotation would not have moved the plates relative to a hotspot.  "Extinction times" would not have moved the plates.  "Biblical references" reflect a world view that did not include plate motion.  Asteroid strikes, at least those that have occurred in the last half billion years, do not change plate motion.  Your "evidence" explains nothing unfortunately.
verisimilidude
CC BY-SA 4.0
2019-04-10T09:00:45.980Z
2019-04-10T09:00:45.980Z
Clive Ward
<p>I don't recall this being considered a real 'mystery'. For decades after Tuzo Wilson's revolutionary Plate Tectonics the accepted explanation was of a change in direction in the plate motion over the mantle plume. I am pretty sure this was still the case when I read Plate Tectonics: How It Works
(by Cox and Hart, Wilson's former students - I encourage you to get the book and work through it, you get to do plate tectonic reconstruction yourself, with paper and pencil, and calculator) in the late nineties. I think the more recent research leans towards a combination of intraplate deformation and movement of the plume itself, combined with the plate motion, 
e.g.</p>

<p>Prediction of Emperor-Hawaii seamount locations from a revised model of global plate motion and mantle flow by Steinberger et al. (Nature 430, 167-173, 8 July 2004) 
<a href="http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v430/n6996/abs/nature02660.html">http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v430/n6996/abs/nature02660.html</a></p>

<p><strong>UPDATED</strong>: as added in a comment below, quoted from the paper's abstract:</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>if a reconstruction through Australia and Lord Howe rise is used
  instead, the track is predicted correctly back to 65 Myr ago,
  including the bend.</p>
</blockquote>

<p>From the first paragraph in the paper:</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>Hotspots are frequently assumed to be fixed and used as a reference
  frame for plate motions. However, when the Hawaiian hotspot track is
  predicted from a global plate motion chain based on relative plate
  motion data, and it is assumed that the Hawaiian hotspot is fixed
  relative to African hotspots, it does not fit the observed track: the
  predicted track is essentially straight, lies south of the Hawaiian
  seamount chain, and has no feature corresponding to the
  Hawaiian-Emperor bend. Explanation of this misfit requires one of the
  following, or a combination of them, to be true: (1) motion of Pacific
  plate hotspots, in particular more than 1,000 km south-westward motion
  for the Hawaiian hotspot between ,80 Myr ago and the time of the bend
  and minor southward motion after this time, (2) motion of hotspots in
  the African hemisphere, (3) motion at an additional plate boundary, or
  (4) deformation at a diffuse intraplate   boundary not included in the
  plate motion chain. Palaeomagnetic data from the Emperor chain3 yield
  a southward component of Hawaiian hotspot motion more than 1,000 km
  relative to the palaeomagnetic axis between ,80 and 49 Myr ago.</p>
</blockquote>

<p>In the rest of the paper they used 2 main models (other models were discarded). The first included only hotspot motion which is sufficient to explain discrepancies between predicted and observed hotspot tracks (e.g. Hawaiian-Emperor chain) back to 47 Ma ago, but before 47 Ma ago the predicted hotspot tracks do not include the bend.
Their second model added intraplate deformation (in their reference plates Antarctica/New Zealand) to hotspot motion and is able to predict the hotspot track all the way back to 65 Ma ago with good accuracy, including the bend, and with less accuracy (meaning that it is off too far to the west) until 85 My ago.</p>

<p><strong>UPDATED SEPTEMBER 17 2014</strong>
The 2004 Nature paper still holds to fixed photspots. It invokes plate circuits (the models I referred to) and intraplate deformation. </p>

<p>Following my comments on September 16th, a google search for "bent Hawaiian-Emperor hotspot" returned a 2009 Science article which instead invokes hotspot motion:
The Bent Hawaiian-Emperor Hotspot Track: Inheriting the Mantle Wind by John Tarduno et al. Science 3 April 2009 (Vol. 324 no. 5923 pp. 50-53). </p>

<p>Abstract at:
<a href="http://www.sciencemag.org/content/324/5923/50">http://www.sciencemag.org/content/324/5923/50</a>. </p>

<p>There's a copy of the pdf article at: <a href="http://www.mantleplumes.org/WebDocuments/Tarduno2009.pdf">http://www.mantleplumes.org/WebDocuments/Tarduno2009.pdf</a> </p>

<p>and a good online animation at:
<a href="http://www.earthmodels.org/publications/science-2009">http://www.earthmodels.org/publications/science-2009</a></p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-09-01T11:51:09.410Z
my understanding is that doesnt explain the motion of the location of the plume itself.  I think. ???  and I am unable to find any explanations that are accepted.???
Alistair Riddoch
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-09-08T13:19:32.030Z
That doesn't really explain the elbow in the middle of the two otherwise *very* straight lines though... Or are they actually arguing that that's not really any different from the rest of the moment? Did anything tectonically interesting happen ~45 million years ago?
naught101
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-09-08T16:22:08.170Z
I quote from the paper's abstract:"if a reconstruction through Australia and Lord Howe rise is used instead, the track is predicted correctly back to 65 Myr ago, including the bend".
MyCarta
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-09-16T23:30:49.893Z
if I understand correctly, then, the rate of movement of the hotspot under hawaii IS explainable because of a chunk of plate near New Zealand is rising?  Which I agree is a nice corelated piece of information.  Assuming we know the cause of the Lord Howe Rise.  Otherwise it seems to me, we are saying, one observation is explained by another observation.  Which to me, seems to leave two observations to be explained, instead of one??
Alistair Riddoch
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-09-16T23:36:41.007Z
I quote Neo from a comment to the original question...                  "a definitive answer to the "bend" would likely result in a very high impact publication."
Alistair Riddoch
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-09-17T02:03:30.473Z
The Lord How Rise is just a plateau. It is not rising or moving. It is used as a pole.  http://www.ga.gov.au/scientific-topics/energy/province-sedimentary-basin-geology/petroleum/offshore-eastern-australia/lord-howe-rise
MyCarta
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-09-17T02:04:39.920Z
The motion of rigid tectonic plates is described/reconstructed as a rotation of a plate with respect to a Euler pole located on another plate. Here's a simple animation: http://www.earth.northwestern.edu/people/seth/demos/BRICK/brick.html
MyCarta
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-09-17T02:07:34.250Z
Question/hint for you: what do you think would happen to the reconstructed motion if the plate where the pole is located, instead of being stationary, also moved? And then what if it also went through a stage of internal deformation (shrinking, expanding, rotating, you name it)?
MyCarta
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-09-17T03:05:31.163Z
Or if the pole itself was not stationary, but every so often it jumped position?
MyCarta
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-09-17T18:12:55.280Z
Just to weigh in, that most of the disagreement here comes from the fact that we know very little about mantle plumes and hotspots, but I think that this is close to the best contemporary answer as possible- well done MyCarta!
Neo
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-09-24T05:41:23.270Z
@MyCarta , et al.,  I'm adding an update to my question, I will include your information MyCarta, please give it a peak.  :-)
Alistair Riddoch
CC BY-SA 4.0
2019-11-15T16:37:11.663Z
More recent models are showing both plume movement and plate motion change contributed. neither by themselves can wholly explain hte change. https://www.nature.com/articles/ncomms15660
John
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-09-01T02:08:57.893Z
2014-12-12T07:28:39.977Z
2014-12-12T07:28:39.977Z
MyCarta
<p>What caused the bend in the Emperor/Hawaii chain of islands, 45 million years ago?</p>

<p>Has there been any updates to this mystery I am unaware of?  Are there any new theories that could potentially explain it?</p>

<p>There is a lot of material but no answer at the link provided.
<a href="http://www.uhh.hawaii.edu/~kenhon/geol205/chain/default.htm" rel="noreferrer">University of Hawaii material discussing the root cause of the pattern of formation of the Emperor and Hawaii chain of islands</a></p>

<p>an excerpt...</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>Perhaps it is even more amazing that in the past 65 million years
  there has been only one such bend. Even more remarkable is the
  observation that the straight portions of the chain are straight. As
  we shall see below, the configuration of the plate boundaries in the
  Pacific have changed dramatically during the lifetime of the Hawaiian
  hotspot. If, as many geophysicists believe, subduction drives
  tectonics, then how on earth can the straight parts be so straight and
  move at constant velocities for tens of millions of years? The answer
  to these questions remains a mystery!</p>
</blockquote>

<p><img src="https://i.sstatic.net/D2vPq.jpg" alt="Bend in the Emperor Hawaii chain of islands"></p>

<p>ADDED:  Sept 1st.  an excerpt from a link to information in the comment below. thank you MyCarta, good information:</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>The bend in the Hawaiian-Emperor seamount chain is a prominent
  feature usually attributed to a change in Pacific plate motion approx
  47 Myr ago. However, global plate motion reconstructions fail to
  predict the bend. Here we show how the geometry of the
  Hawaiian-Emperor chain and other hotspot tracks can be explained when
  we combine global plate motions with intraplate deformation and
  movement of hotspot plumes through distortion by global mantle flow.
  Global mantle flow models predict a southward motion of the Hawaiian
  hotspot. This, in combination with a plate motion reconstruction
  connecting Pacific and African plates through Antarctica, predicts the
  Hawaiian track correctly since the date of the bend, but predicts the
  chain to be too far west before it. But if a reconstruction through
  Australia and Lord Howe rise is used instead, the track is predicted
  correctly back to 65 Myr ago, including the bend. The difference
  between the two predictions indicates the effect of intraplate
  deformation not yet recognized or else not recorded on the ocean
  floor. The remaining misfit before 65 Myr ago can be attributed to
  additional intraplate deformation of similar magnitude.</p>
</blockquote>

<p>I don't know if that is definitive or not?</p>

<p>I have come across this image showing the lately determined "pattern of expansion" the earth is undergoing:  perhaps then the quote above is indicating a "perceived balance caused in the expansion as correctly predicting and matching the movement of the plume and plates relative to the pattern?</p>

<p><img src="https://i.sstatic.net/znO31.jpg" alt="Pattern of overall tectonic plate expansion"></p>

<p>****UPDATE Sept 24th -- Information from MyCarta** </p>

<p>MyCarta "I think the more recent research leans towards a combination of intraplate deformation and movement of the plume itself, combined with the plate motion, e.g."</p>

<p>And about Euler plates, and Lord Howe's Rise</p>

<p><a href="http://www.earth.northwestern.edu/people/seth/demos/BRICK/brick.html" rel="noreferrer">http://www.earth.northwestern.edu/people/seth/demos/BRICK/brick.html</a></p>

<p>as added in a comment below, quoted from the paper's abstract:</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>if a reconstruction through Australia and Lord Howe rise is used
  instead, the track is predicted correctly back to 65 Myr ago,
  including the bend.</p>
</blockquote>

<p>From the first paragraph in the paper:</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>Hotspots are frequently assumed to be fixed and used as a reference
  frame for plate motions. However, when the Hawaiian hotspot track is
  predicted from a global plate motion chain based on relative plate
  motion data, and it is assumed that the Hawaiian hotspot is fixed
  relative to African hotspots, it does not fit the observed track: the
  predicted track is essentially straight, lies south of the Hawaiian
  seamount chain, and has no feature corresponding to the
  Hawaiian-Emperor bend. Explanation of this misfit requires one of the
  following, or a combination of them, to be true: (1) motion of Pacific
  plate hotspots, in particular more than 1,000 km south-westward motion
  for the Hawaiian hotspot between ,80 Myr ago and the time of the bend
  and minor southward motion after this time, (2) motion of hotspots in
  the African hemisphere, (3) motion at an additional plate boundary, or
  (4) deformation at a diffuse intraplate boundary not included in the
  plate motion chain. Palaeomagnetic data from the Emperor chain3 yield
  a southward component of Hawaiian hotspot motion more than 1,000 km
  relative to the palaeomagnetic axis between ,80 and 49 Myr ago.</p>
</blockquote>

<p>In the rest of the paper they used 2 main models (other models were discarded). The first included only hotspot motion which is sufficient to explain discrepancies between predicted and observed hotspot tracks (e.g. Hawaiian-Emperor chain) back to 47 Ma ago, but before 47 Ma ago the predicted hotspot tracks do not include the bend. Their second model added intraplate deformation (in their reference plates Antarctica/New Zealand) to hotspot motion and is able to predict the hotspot track all the way back to 65 Ma ago with good accuracy, including the bend, and with less accuracy (meaning that it is off too far to the west) until 85 My ago."</p>

<p><strong>Sept 24th MORE QUESTION</strong></p>

<p>I'm getting the feeling tectonic plate heave and settle and patterns of interaction are the current best theory for the resulting relative motion of the Hawaii hotspot.</p>

<p>So we are increasing the scale of the question to ask what is it that drives the schedule of the tectonic plates, such that the result is the ever so slow motion of the Hawaii hotspot.  What is felt to be the root cause of <strong>timing</strong> of plate and continent shift??</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-08-28T07:08:15.100Z
Even the mechanism to how the Emperor Island chain is hotly debated, a definitive answer to the "bend" would likely result in a very high impact publication.
Neo
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-09-25T15:03:34.173Z
Hi Alistair, it would be nice if you choose my answer, if you liked it. Your September 24th update is definitely worth a new question, although it is a bit generic and you may want to give it a bit of substance and focus.
MyCarta
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-09-25T15:05:48.400Z
Having said that, there's plenty in the reference material provided to get started. The main driver is without question mantle convection, regardless of wether hot spots are stationary or not, and wether plates deform or not. in the 2009 Tarduno et al. paper I referenced there's quite a bit on that.
MyCarta
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-09-25T15:13:41.910Z
Although I suggest going back and doing some serious, in-depth reading on plate tectonic itself. I really recommend working the Cox and Hart book front to back. You will work out all the details of both theory and practice of it, with pencil, paper an scissors, or a computer if you're into programming (all formulations are already worked out in the book and one only nead to transfer them to Python, Matlab, or power calculator).
MyCarta
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-09-25T15:15:02.720Z
One more thing to bear in mind: we stil ldo not know all about the why and the timing. It's to answer these questions that the Caltech Tectonic Observatory was created. Check them out, they're awesome. I'm outta here. :)
MyCarta
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-09-25T15:37:09.727Z
Ah, one last thing, check Carlo Doglioni's work on mantle dynamics. E.g. Subduction kinematics and dynamic constraints, Earth Earth-Science Reviews 83 (2007) 125-175, or online Mantle dynamics and plate kinematics http://www.dst.uniroma1.it/dst1/sciterra/sezioni/doglioni/Publ_download/E6-15-03-13-TXT.aspx.html
MyCarta
<geology><plate-tectonics><hotspot>
What caused the bend in the Emperor/Hawaii chain of islands, 45 million years ago?
Alistair Riddoch
# What caused the bend in the Emperor/Hawaii chain of islands, 45 million years ago?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2014-08-28)

What caused the bend in the Emperor/Hawaii chain of islands, 45 million years ago?

Has there been any updates to this mystery I am unaware of? Are there any new theories that could potentially explain it?

There is a lot of material but no answer at the link provided.
[University of Hawaii material discussing the root cause of the pattern of formation of the Emperor and Hawaii chain of islands](http://www.uhh.hawaii.edu/~kenhon/geol205/chain/default.htm)

an excerpt...

> Perhaps it is even more amazing that in the past 65 million years
> there has been only one such bend. Even more remarkable is the
> observation that the straight portions of the chain are straight. As
> we shall see below, the configuration of the plate boundaries in the
> Pacific have changed dramatically during the lifetime of the Hawaiian
> hotspot. If, as many geophysicists believe, subduction drives
> tectonics, then how on earth can the straight parts be so straight and
> move at constant velocities for tens of millions of years? The answer
> to these questions remains a mystery!

![Bend in the Emperor Hawaii chain of islands](https://i.sstatic.net/D2vPq.jpg)

ADDED: Sept 1st. an excerpt from a link to information in the comment below. thank you username_2, good information:

> The bend in the Hawaiian-Emperor seamount chain is a prominent
> feature usually attributed to a change in Pacific plate motion approx
> 47 Myr ago. However, global plate motion reconstructions fail to
> predict the bend. Here we show how the geometry of the
> Hawaiian-Emperor chain and other hotspot tracks can be explained when
> we combine global plate motions with intraplate deformation and
> movement of hotspot plumes through distortion by global mantle flow.
> Global mantle flow models predict a southward motion of the Hawaiian
> hotspot. This, in combination with a plate motion reconstruction
> connecting Pacific and African plates through Antarctica, predicts the
> Hawaiian track correctly since the date of the bend, but predicts the
> chain to be too far west before it. But if a reconstruction through
> Australia and Lord Howe rise is used instead, the track is predicted
> correctly back to 65 Myr ago, including the bend. The difference
> between the two predictions indicates the effect of intraplate
> deformation not yet recognized or else not recorded on the ocean
> floor. The remaining misfit before 65 Myr ago can be attributed to
> additional intraplate deformation of similar magnitude.

I don't know if that is definitive or not?

I have come across this image showing the lately determined "pattern of expansion" the earth is undergoing: perhaps then the quote above is indicating a "perceived balance caused in the expansion as correctly predicting and matching the movement of the plume and plates relative to the pattern?

![Pattern of overall tectonic plate expansion](https://i.sstatic.net/znO31.jpg)

\*\*\*\*UPDATE Sept 24th -- Information from username_2\*\*

username_2 "I think the more recent research leans towards a combination of intraplate deformation and movement of the plume itself, combined with the plate motion, e.g."

And about Euler plates, and Lord Howe's Rise

<http://www.earth.northwestern.edu/people/seth/demos/BRICK/brick.html>

as added in a comment below, quoted from the paper's abstract:

> if a reconstruction through Australia and Lord Howe rise is used
> instead, the track is predicted correctly back to 65 Myr ago,
> including the bend.

From the first paragraph in the paper:

> Hotspots are frequently assumed to be fixed and used as a reference
> frame for plate motions. However, when the Hawaiian hotspot track is
> predicted from a global plate motion chain based on relative plate
> motion data, and it is assumed that the Hawaiian hotspot is fixed
> relative to African hotspots, it does not fit the observed track: the
> predicted track is essentially straight, lies south of the Hawaiian
> seamount chain, and has no feature corresponding to the
> Hawaiian-Emperor bend. Explanation of this misfit requires one of the
> following, or a combination of them, to be true: (1) motion of Pacific
> plate hotspots, in particular more than 1,000 km south-westward motion
> for the Hawaiian hotspot between ,80 Myr ago and the time of the bend
> and minor southward motion after this time, (2) motion of hotspots in
> the African hemisphere, (3) motion at an additional plate boundary, or
> (4) deformation at a diffuse intraplate boundary not included in the
> plate motion chain. Palaeomagnetic data from the Emperor chain3 yield
> a southward component of Hawaiian hotspot motion more than 1,000 km
> relative to the palaeomagnetic axis between ,80 and 49 Myr ago.

In the rest of the paper they used 2 main models (other models were discarded). The first included only hotspot motion which is sufficient to explain discrepancies between predicted and observed hotspot tracks (e.g. Hawaiian-Emperor chain) back to 47 Ma ago, but before 47 Ma ago the predicted hotspot tracks do not include the bend. Their second model added intraplate deformation (in their reference plates Antarctica/New Zealand) to hotspot motion and is able to predict the hotspot track all the way back to 65 Ma ago with good accuracy, including the bend, and with less accuracy (meaning that it is off too far to the west) until 85 My ago."

**Sept 24th MORE QUESTION**

I'm getting the feeling tectonic plate heave and settle and patterns of interaction are the current best theory for the resulting relative motion of the Hawaii hotspot.

So we are increasing the scale of the question to ask what is it that drives the schedule of the tectonic plates, such that the result is the ever so slow motion of the Hawaii hotspot. What is felt to be the root cause of **timing** of plate and continent shift??

**Tags:** geology, plate-tectonics, hotspot

> **Comments:**
> **username_1**: Even the mechanism to how the Emperor Island chain is hotly debated, a definitive answer to the "bend" would likely result in a very high impact publication.  
> **username_2**: Hi username_0, it would be nice if you choose my answer, if you liked it. Your September 24th update is definitely worth a new question, although it is a bit generic and you may want to give it a bit of substance and focus.  
> **username_2**: Having said that, there's plenty in the reference material provided to get started. The main driver is without question mantle convection, regardless of wether hot spots are stationary or not, and wether plates deform or not. in the 2009 Tarduno et al. paper I referenced there's quite a bit on that.  
> **username_2**: Although I suggest going back and doing some serious, in-depth reading on plate tectonic itself. I really recommend working the Cox and Hart book front to back. You will work out all the details of both theory and practice of it, with pencil, paper an scissors, or a computer if you're into programming (all formulations are already worked out in the book and one only nead to transfer them to Python, Matlab, or power calculator).  
> **username_2**: One more thing to bear in mind: we stil ldo not know all about the why and the timing. It's to answer these questions that the Caltech Tectonic Observatory was created. Check them out, they're awesome. I'm outta here. :)  
> **username_2**: Ah, one last thing, check Carlo Doglioni's work on mantle dynamics. E.g. Subduction kinematics and dynamic constraints, Earth Earth-Science Reviews 83 (2007) 125-175, or online Mantle dynamics and plate kinematics http://www.dst.uniroma1.it/dst1/sciterra/sezioni/doglioni/Publ_download/E6-15-03-13-TXT.aspx.html  

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## 3 answers

### Answer by username_2 on 2014-09-01. Score: 15 | Accepted answer

I don't recall this being considered a real 'mystery'. For decades after Tuzo Wilson's revolutionary Plate Tectonics the accepted explanation was of a change in direction in the plate motion over the mantle plume. I am pretty sure this was still the case when I read Plate Tectonics: How It Works
(by Cox and Hart, Wilson's former students - I encourage you to get the book and work through it, you get to do plate tectonic reconstruction yourself, with paper and pencil, and calculator) in the late nineties. I think the more recent research leans towards a combination of intraplate deformation and movement of the plume itself, combined with the plate motion,
e.g.

Prediction of Emperor-Hawaii seamount locations from a revised model of global plate motion and mantle flow by Steinberger et al. (Nature 430, 167-173, 8 July 2004)
<http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v430/n6996/abs/nature02660.html>

**UPDATED**: as added in a comment below, quoted from the paper's abstract:

> if a reconstruction through Australia and Lord Howe rise is used
> instead, the track is predicted correctly back to 65 Myr ago,
> including the bend.

From the first paragraph in the paper:

> Hotspots are frequently assumed to be fixed and used as a reference
> frame for plate motions. However, when the Hawaiian hotspot track is
> predicted from a global plate motion chain based on relative plate
> motion data, and it is assumed that the Hawaiian hotspot is fixed
> relative to African hotspots, it does not fit the observed track: the
> predicted track is essentially straight, lies south of the Hawaiian
> seamount chain, and has no feature corresponding to the
> Hawaiian-Emperor bend. Explanation of this misfit requires one of the
> following, or a combination of them, to be true: (1) motion of Pacific
> plate hotspots, in particular more than 1,000 km south-westward motion
> for the Hawaiian hotspot between ,80 Myr ago and the time of the bend
> and minor southward motion after this time, (2) motion of hotspots in
> the African hemisphere, (3) motion at an additional plate boundary, or
> (4) deformation at a diffuse intraplate boundary not included in the
> plate motion chain. Palaeomagnetic data from the Emperor chain3 yield
> a southward component of Hawaiian hotspot motion more than 1,000 km
> relative to the palaeomagnetic axis between ,80 and 49 Myr ago.

In the rest of the paper they used 2 main models (other models were discarded). The first included only hotspot motion which is sufficient to explain discrepancies between predicted and observed hotspot tracks (e.g. Hawaiian-Emperor chain) back to 47 Ma ago, but before 47 Ma ago the predicted hotspot tracks do not include the bend.
Their second model added intraplate deformation (in their reference plates Antarctica/New Zealand) to hotspot motion and is able to predict the hotspot track all the way back to 65 Ma ago with good accuracy, including the bend, and with less accuracy (meaning that it is off too far to the west) until 85 My ago.

**UPDATED SEPTEMBER 17 2014**
The 2004 Nature paper still holds to fixed photspots. It invokes plate circuits (the models I referred to) and intraplate deformation.

Following my comments on September 16th, a google search for "bent Hawaiian-Emperor hotspot" returned a 2009 Science article which instead invokes hotspot motion:
The Bent Hawaiian-Emperor Hotspot Track: Inheriting the Mantle Wind by username_8 Tarduno et al. Science 3 April 2009 (Vol. 324 no. 5923 pp. 50-53).

Abstract at:
<http://www.sciencemag.org/content/324/5923/50>.

There's a copy of the pdf article at: <http://www.mantleplumes.org/WebDocuments/Tarduno2009.pdf>

and a good online animation at:
<http://www.earthmodels.org/publications/science-2009>

> **Comments:**
> **username_0**: my understanding is that doesnt explain the motion of the location of the plume itself.  I think. ???  and I am unable to find any explanations that are accepted.???  
> **username_7**: That doesn't really explain the elbow in the middle of the two otherwise *very* straight lines though... Or are they actually arguing that that's not really any different from the rest of the moment? Did anything tectonically interesting happen ~45 million years ago?  
> **username_2**: I quote from the paper's abstract:"if a reconstruction through Australia and Lord Howe rise is used instead, the track is predicted correctly back to 65 Myr ago, including the bend".  
> **username_0**: if I understand correctly, then, the rate of movement of the hotspot under hawaii IS explainable because of a chunk of plate near New Zealand is rising?  Which I agree is a nice corelated piece of information.  Assuming we know the cause of the Lord Howe Rise.  Otherwise it seems to me, we are saying, one observation is explained by another observation.  Which to me, seems to leave two observations to be explained, instead of one??  
> **username_0**: I quote Neo from a comment to the original question...                  "a definitive answer to the "bend" would likely result in a very high impact publication."  
> **username_2**: The Lord How Rise is just a plateau. It is not rising or moving. It is used as a pole.  http://www.ga.gov.au/scientific-topics/energy/province-sedimentary-basin-geology/petroleum/offshore-eastern-australia/lord-howe-rise  
> **username_2**: The motion of rigid tectonic plates is described/reconstructed as a rotation of a plate with respect to a Euler pole located on another plate. Here's a simple animation: http://www.earth.northwestern.edu/people/seth/demos/BRICK/brick.html  
> **username_2**: Question/hint for you: what do you think would happen to the reconstructed motion if the plate where the pole is located, instead of being stationary, also moved? And then what if it also went through a stage of internal deformation (shrinking, expanding, rotating, you name it)?  
> **username_2**: Or if the pole itself was not stationary, but every so often it jumped position?  
> **username_1**: Just to weigh in, that most of the disagreement here comes from the fact that we know very little about mantle plumes and hotspots, but I think that this is close to the best contemporary answer as possible- well done username_2!  
> **username_0**: @username_2 , et al.,  I'm adding an update to my question, I will include your information username_2, please give it a peak.  :-)  
> **username_8**: More recent models are showing both plume movement and plate motion change contributed. neither by themselves can wholly explain hte change. https://www.nature.com/articles/ncomms15660  

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### Answer by username_3 on 2020-05-05. Score: 2

If I look at Google Earth imagery, it is not just the Hawaii Emperor Seamount Chain, but also those of Louisville Hotspot Chain and Society or Pitcairn Hotspot Chains show a slight bend , the Louisville Chain shows a more 'graceful' bend like a gradual 30° bend and Society or Pitcairn somewhere like 40° bend and the Hawaii emperor seamount chain shows a more abrupt bend - like almost 60°. This I suspect could be due to relative changes in the expansion rate of the southernmost (Pact plate+ Antarctic Plate) and eastern sections (Pac Plate+Nazca) of the East Pacific rise after disappearance of the former Phoenix plate (underneath East Antarctica) , as well as a failure of the Indo Australian ridge spreading at 90 East ridge somewhere 45 to 43 Mya, after which Australia started moving northward instead of Eastward so the vector product of the 2 plate motions now has a different direction which has direct bearing on the hotspot track vector.

The northern segment of Farallon Plate has subducted under North America , and the oldest remnants of Emperor Hotspot track are undergoing flat slab subduction at the cusp of Aleutian and Kuril Kamchatka trenches in the vicinity of Kommandor and Attu Island - this accounts for the cessation or relative 'inactivity' of volcanism in this segment of the otherwise volatile Pacific ring of fire as less seepage of ocean water into trench and formation of accretionary prism from the volcanic rocks on track guyots.

Consider that in the absence of West to East stresses from the breakup of Indo-Australian plate over the East west spreading 90 East ridge , the Galapagos rise E-W spreading center in the Pacific is able to make its impact felt on the E-W spreading direction and the resultant vector product of pacific plate movement is now oriented in a east-north easterly direction instead of being north by north east directed and no longer driven exclusively from the pacific antarctic ridge . The impact of this is attenuated the further south you get so Louisville hotspot chain is less impacted , but nevertheless shows a bend .

Contrary to the mainstream thought, subduction does not drive plate tectonics, rather its seafloor spreading or rifting that does. Subduction is just a terminal effect of forces acting from the spreading centre. Mantle Current intensity at spreading ridges drives subduction at distal ends . Another thing I strongly suspect is that modern East And West Antarctica were different continental cratons that fused after a small ocean that separated them closed and this suture is now marked by the Mid Antarctic mountain system. In fact a total ice melt of Antarctica may still reveal a tiny oceanic waterway remnant. So it is highly likely the seafloor spread rate between Pacific and Nazca plates increased substantially after 45 - 40 Mya.

Primary Ref :
[Torsvik, T., Doubrovine, P., Steinberger, B. et al. Pacific plate motion change caused the Hawaiian-Emperor Bend. Nat Commun 8, 15660 (2017).](https://www.nature.com/articles/ncomms15660)

[Plate-tectonic reconstructions predict part of the Hawaiian hotspot
track to be preserved in the Bering Sea
Bernhard Steinberger; Carmen Gaina :
Center for Geodynamics, Geological Survey of Norway, Leiv Eirikssons vei 39,N-7491 Trondheim, Norway](https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=&ved=2ahUKEwi1gOiblvvvAhXSGs0KHRtzA34QFjACegQIBBAD&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.earthdynamics.org%2Fsteinberger%2Fpapers%2Fi0091-7613-35-5-407.pdf&usg=AOvVaw3xndyiSein-bxcRHKJqhL6)

And more useful background info here on Panthalassa.

[Intra-Panthalassa Ocean subduction zones revealed by fossil arcs and mantle structure](https://www.nature.com/articles/ngeo1401)

[Before the Pacific: finding the lost islands of a Pangea-era ocean](https://arstechnica.com/science/2012/03/before-the-pacific-putting-ancient-islands-back-on-the-map/)

[Ninety East ridge-Wiki](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ninety_East_Ridge)

[Sager, W. W.; Paul, C.F.; Krishna, K.S.; Pringle, M.S.; Eisin, A.E.; Frey, F.A.; Rao, D.G.; Levchenko, O.V. (September 2010). "Large fault fabric of the Ninetyeast Ridge implies near-spreading ridge formation" (PDF).](http://drs.nio.org/drs/bitstream/handle/2264/3723/Geophys_Res_Lett_37_L17304a.pdf;jsessionid=461CB977F758BA6481C26138CB4EA5FD?sequence=1)


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### Answer by username_4 on 2019-04-10. Score: -2

At the time the bend occurred, the earth had a different angle of rotation. Look east of NZ, follow faults in the floor of the pacific and other places, seamount chains etc. Think extinction times, biblical reference to the sun stopping or going backward etc. Whether the result of an asteroid strike, or just a rotational wobble, it explains a lot. The Emporer chain, much of which has now gone under, shows the original line of rotation. The Hawaiian chain the new angle of rotation.

> **Comments:**
> **username_5**: [Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sagan_standard)  
> **username_0**: The end happened tens of millions of years ago.  Humanity came on the scene within the past few hundred thousand years.  The bible is about 2,700 years ago.  It seems, to say the least, unlikely that the bible can provide any hints or clues as to the cause of the bend in the Emperor/Hawaii chain.  
> **username_6**: A change in the angle of earth's rotation would not have moved the plates relative to a hotspot.  "Extinction times" would not have moved the plates.  "Biblical references" reflect a world view that did not include plate motion.  Asteroid strikes, at least those that have occurred in the last half billion years, do not change plate motion.  Your "evidence" explains nothing unfortunately.  

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