The Christmas Mountains caldera complex, Trans-Pecos Texas

Abstract

The Christmas Mountains caldera complex developed approximately 42 Ma ago over an elliptical (8×5 km) laccolithic dome that formed during emplacement of the caldera magma body. Rocks of the caldera complex consist of tuffs, lavas, and volcaniclastic deposits, divided into five sequences. Three of the sequences contain major ash-flow tuffs whose eruption led to collapse of four calderas, all 1–1.5 km in diameter, over the dome. The oldest caldera-related rocks are sparsely porphyritic, rhyolitic, air-fall and ash-flow tuffs that record formation and collapse of a Plinian-type eruption column. Eruption of these tuffs induced collapse of a wedge along the western margin of the dome. A second, more abundantly porphyritic tuff led to collapse of a second caldera that partly overlapped the first. The last major eruptions were abundantly porphyritic, peralkaline quartz-trachyte ash-flow tuffs that ponded within two calderas over the crest of the dome. The tuffs are interbedded with coarse breccias that resulted from failure of the caldera walls. The Christmas Mountains caldera complex and two similar structures in Trans-Pecos Texas constitute a newly recognized caldera type, here termed a laccocaldera. They differ from more conventional calderas by having developed over thin laccolithic magma chambers rather than more deep-seated bodies, by their extreme precaldera doming and by their small size. However, they are similar to other calderas in having initial Plinian-type air-fall eruption followed by column collapse and ash-flow generation, multiple cycles of eruption, contemporaneous eruption and collapse, apparent pistonlike subsidence of the calderas, and compositional zoning within the magma chamber. Laccocalderas could occur else-where, particularly in alkalic magma belts in areas of undeformed sedimentary rocks.