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Submarine landslides or slumps may generate turbidity currents consisting of mixture of sediment and water. Large and fast-moving turbidity currents can incise and erode continental margins and cause damage to artificial structures such as telecommunication cables on the seafloor. In this study, we report that eleven submarine cables across the Kaoping canyon and Manila trench were broken in sequence from 1500 to 4000 m deep, as a consequence of submarine landslides and turbidity currents associated with the 2006 Pingtung earthquakes offshore SW Taiwan. We have established a full-scale scenario and calculation of the turbidity currents along the Kaoping canyon channel from the middle continental slope to the adjacent deep ocean. Our results show that turbidity current velocities vary downstream ranging from 20 to 3.7 and 5.7 m s -1 , which demonstrates a positive relationship between turbidity current velocity and bathymetric slope. The violent cable failures happened in this case evidenced the destructive power of the turbidity current to seafloor or underwater facilities that should not be underestimated.

To understand the tectonic characteristics and age of the northwestern part of the West Philippine Basin (WPB), multi-beam bathymetry and geomagnetic data have been collected and analyzed. The seafloor morphology obviously shows NW-SE trending seafloor fabrics and NE-SW trending fracture zones, indicating a NE-SW seafloor spreading direction. An overlapping spreading center near 22°20 0 N and 125°E is identified. Besides, numerous seamounts indicate an excess supply of magma during or after the oceanic crust formation. A V-shaped seamount chain near 21°52 0 N and 124°26 0 E indicates a southeastward magma propagation and also indicates the location of the seafloor spreading ridge. On the basis of the newly collected geomagnetic data, the magnetic anomaly shows NW-SE trending magnetic lineations. Both bathymetry and geomagnetic data reveal NE-SW seafloor spreading features between the Gagua Ridge and the Luzon Okinawa fracture zone (LOFZ). Our magnetic age modeling indicates that the age of the northwestern corner of the WPB west of the LOFZ is between 47.5 to 54 Ma (without including overlapping spreading center), which is linked to the first spreading phase of the WPB to the east of the LOFZ. In addition, the age of the Huatung Basin is identified to be between 33 to 42 Ma, which is similar to the second spreading phase of the WPB.

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