Reconstructing the tsunami record in Tirúa, Central Chile beyond the historical record with quartz-based SAR-OSL

The most recent high magnitude seismic events, e.g. the M w 8.2 Iquique earthquake (April 1st, 2014) and the M w 8.8 Maule earthquake (February 27th, 2010) are reminders of the pronounced vulnerability of the Chilean coast to the impact of natural hazards like earthquakes and tsunamis. Therefore it is crucial to understand the complex tsunami history of Chile which can be deciphered by studying the geological record of former tsunamis in the form of tsunami deposits. At the coastal locality of Tirua (Central Chile) six distinct, successive tsunamigenic sand layers are intercalated in fine grained floodplain sediments. We present the optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) analysis of quartz from samples of this sedimentological river marsh profile of 1.5 m depth. After the assessment of the applicability of OSL to these samples, it could be noted that despite of an expected low OSL sensitivity of the quartz from the South American Cordillera, most of the sampled quartz yielded a detectable natural signal. After performance tests according to the SAR-protocol, the measurements of the different tsunami sand layers were conducted with small (2.5 mm) aliquots of quartz with the preheat temperature 180 °C. The calculation of D e was provided by applying both the central age and minimum age models. All samples are heterogeneous in their D e distributions due to incomplete or absent significant bleaching during transport by tsunami. The resulting ages of the tsunami sediments yield an offset of nearly 200 years for CAM ages and less than 50 years for MAM ages, consequently favouring MAM ages for true burial age determination. In some tsunami sand layers and their surrounding river marsh sediments age inversions occur. They were caused by the initial deposition of well bleached sediments derived from beach and dunes followed by older sediments redeposited from beach and intertidal environments during tsunami flow. Despite the offset and age inversion six different tsunami events were dated in the Tirua profile. Three of these events extend the historical record to pre-Columbian time with the oldest tsunami dated to over 1500 years before present.