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During the summer of 2010 we carried out a survey to acquire a multidisciplinary dataset within the Gulf of Sant'Eufemia (south-eastern Tyrrhenian sea, Italy), with the aim of studying the active tectonics affecting the region, including that potentially responsible for key, elusive earthquakes such as the to-date unexplained September 8, 1905 (MW 7-7.5) earthquake. The data here analyzed highlight the presence of several tectonic and morphologic features characterizing the investigated area. We have recognized the Angitola Channel, a deep and wide canyon showing a straight trend in its coastward segment, and a meandering trend in the seaward segment. Based on morpho-structural elements, we maintain that the Angitola Channel could be tectonically controlled. Moreover, several gravitational instabilities as slumps and slides affect the flanks of the morpho-structural high, detected offshore Capo Vaticano. Very high resolution seismic data have unveiled the presence of numerous fluid escape features and several mud volcanoes straddling the sector from the coastline to seawards. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: We present new high-resolution swath bathymetric data and multichannel seismic profiles acquired in the Pantelleria graben, one of the three main tectonic depressions forming the Sicily Channel Rift Zone. This region experienced a Late Miocene–Early Pliocene continental extension with the development of NW-trending, fault-bounded troughs, later accompanied by widespread volcanic manifestations. Data support the interpretation that the Pantelleria graben evolution was dominated by two tectonic phases: A lithospheric-scale continental rifting (Early Pliocene), in which the whole graben was formed, and a successive phase (Late Pliocene–Pleistocene) characterized by a magma-assisted extensional mechanism. Ascending magmas within the graben floor seem to migrate from the S–E sector of the depression toward the N–W sector, which is almost entirely floored by igneous material, and where the volcanic edifice of the Pantelleria Island is emerged. The volcanic activity is presently concentrated north of the Pantelleria Island. The tectonic evolution of the Pantelleria graben, characterized by the chronological sequence of events: rifting-doming-volcanism, can be referred to as a ‘passive’ rifting model. Crustal stretching, and subsequent fault development and rifting within the Pelagian block, may have been controlled by slab-pull forces of the northward-subducting African slab. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]