Whether subducted oceanic reliefs such as seamounts promote seismic rupture or aseismic slip remains controversial. Here we use swath bathymetry, prestack depth‐migrated multichannel seismic reflection lines, and wide‐angle seismic data collected across the central Ecuador subduction segment to reveal a broad ~55 km × 50 km, ~1.5–2.0 km high, low height‐to‐width ratio, multipeaked, sediment‐bare, shallow subducted oceanic relief. Owing to La Plata Island and the coastline being located, respectively, ~35 km and ~50–60 km from the trench, GPS measurements allow us to demonstrate that the subducted oceanic relief spatially correlates to a shallow, ~80 km × 55 km locked interplate asperity within a dominantly creeping subduction segment. The oceanic relief geometrical anomaly together with its highly jagged topography, the absence of a subduction channel, and a stiff erosive oceanic margin are found to be long‐term geological characteristics associated with the shallow locking of the megathrust. Although the size and level of locking observed at the subducted relief scale could produce an Mw >7+ event, no large earthquakes are known to have happened for several centuries. On the contrary, frequent slow slip events have been recorded since 2010 within the locked patch, and regular seismic swarms have occurred in this area during the last 40 years. These transient processes, together with the rough subducted oceanic topography, suggest that interplate friction might actually be heterogeneous within the locked patch. Additionally, we find that the subducted relief undergoes internal shearing and produces a permanent flexural bulge of the margin, which uplifted La Plata Island.

[1] The origin of the Algerian margin remains one of the key questions still discussed in the Western Mediterranean sea, due to the imprecise nature and kinematics of the associated basin during the Neogene. For the first time, the deep structure of the Maghrebian margin was explored during the SPIRAL seismic survey. In this work, we present a N-S transect off Tipaza (west of Algiers), a place where the margin broadens due to a topographic high (Khayr-al-Din Bank). New deep penetration seismic profiles allow us to image the sedimentary sequence in the Algerian basin and the crustal structure at the continent-ocean boundary. Modeling of the wide-angle data shows thinning of the basement, from more than 15 km in the continental upper margin to only 5-6 km of oceanic-type basement in the Algerian basin, and reveals a very narrow or absent transitional zone. Analysis of the deep structure of the margin indicates features inherited from its complex evolution: (1) an oceanic-type crust in the deep basin, (2) similarities with margins formed in a transform-type setting, (3) a progressive deepening of the whole sedimentary cover, and the thickening of the Plio-Quaternary sediments at the margin foot, coeval with (4) a downward flexure of the basement in the basin. These features argue for a multiphased evolution of the margin, including (1) an early stage of rifting and/or spreading, (2) a late transcurrent episode related to the westward migration of the Alboran domain, and (3) a diffuse Plio-Quaternary compressional reactivation of the margin.

The Natal Valley, offshore Mozambique, is a key area for understanding the evolution of East Gondwana. Within the scope of the integrated multidisciplinary PAMELA project, we present new wide-angle seismic data and interpretations, which considerably alter Geoscience paradigms. These data reveal the presence of a 30-km-thick crust that we argue to be of continental nature. This falsifies all the most recent palaeoreconstructions of the Gondwana. This 30-km-thick continental crust 1,000 m below sea level implies a complex history with probable intrusions of mantle-derived melts in the lower crust, connected to several occurrences of magmatism, which seems to evidence the crucial role of the lower continental crust in passive margin genesis. S U PP O RTI N G I N FO R M ATI O NAdditional supporting information may be found online in the Supporting Information section. Figure S1. Example of the OBS data MZ1OBS30 on profile MZ1. Data S1. Multi-channel seismic (MCS) data.