Pacific Plate

[puh-sif-ik pleyt]

noun

Geology.

1. one of the major tectonic divisions of the earth's crust, comprising four seafloor basins: separated from the Nazca, Cocos, North American, and South American Plates by the East Pacific Rise and San Andreas Fault and bounded in the western Pacific Ocean by a series of major ocean deeps, including the Kuril, Japan, Mariana, Kermadec, and Tonga Trenches.

Word History and Origins

Origin of Pacific Plate¹

First recorded in 1960–65

Example Sentences

There, the Pacific Plate slides beneath the North American Plate in what’s known as a subduction fault.

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It sounds harmless enough, and even more so when you realize that the Pacific Plate creeps westward at only about three and a half inches per year.

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Over time, the movement of the Pacific Plate pulls the North American Plate downward, like the bucket of a catapult that is being readied to fire.

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At 2:46 P.M. on March 11, an area of the North American Plate about 190 miles long broke free from the Pacific Plate.

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The Pacific Plate had slid westward, but the North American Plate had also jumped.

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