Constraining the Magmatic Plumbing System in a Zoned Continental Flood Basalt Province

Abstract

Abstract The geographic heterogeneities in lava composition observed in continental flood basalt provinces could provide a probe of material upwelling from the deep mantle and their length scales, but their utility is limited by uncertainties in the locus of magmatism. We examine the magma plumbing system for the Oligocene Ethiopian flood basalts. The province, which exhibits domains defined by the eruption of low‐Ti (LT) and high‐Ti (HT) lavas, requires a magmatic plumbing system that facilitates the transit of compositionally distinct magmas through the crust without mixing. Here we present a geochemical and geochronological study of a suite of 43 dikes from western Ethiopia. We find that the dikes were dominantly emplaced contemporaneously with the Oligocene flood basalt phase of activity. The composition of the dikes is overwhelmingly LT in character, typified by an overall flat rare earth element pattern (median value of La/LuCN = 2.6), and a lack of enrichment in incompatible trace elements in comparison to the HT lavas. These observations confirm the western Ethiopian dike swarm as a source for the LT flood basalts in the Ethiopian flood basalt province. We also present tentative evidence for an eastward migration in the LT dike system over time. These observations are consistent with the terminal stages of the LT magmatism being centered on the Simien shield volcano. We conclude that the apparent separation of ~400 km between the LT and HT magma plumbing systems allowed for the development of a strongly geochemically zoned continental flood basalt province.