Cocos Plate

The Cocos Plate is an oceanic tectonic plate beneath the eastern Pacific Ocean. It subducts beneath the Caribbean Plate and North American Plate along Central America.

Middle America Trench: A deep ocean trench extending along the Pacific margin of Central America, where oceanic crust descends beneath the region. This trench marks the Cocos Plate’s subduction boundary along much of Central America.
East Pacific Rise: A mid-ocean ridge system where tectonic plates spread apart and new oceanic crust forms. Seafloor spreading at its eastern reaches helped create crust now carried by the Cocos Plate.
2017 Chiapas earthquake: A magnitude 8.2 earthquake that struck off southern Mexico on September 7, 2017. It ruptured within the descending Cocos Plate beneath the North American Plate.
Caribbean Plate: A mostly oceanic tectonic plate carrying the Caribbean Sea and parts of Central America and the Caribbean islands. The Cocos Plate descends beneath its western margin along Central America.
Subduction: The process by which one tectonic plate sinks beneath another into the mantle. The Cocos Plate’s descent beneath neighboring plates is a major example of this process.
Pacific-Farallon Ridge: A former mid-ocean ridge that separated the Pacific Plate from the Farallon Plate. Its fragmentation contributed to the formation of the Cocos and Nazca plates.
2012 El Salvador earthquake: A magnitude 7.3 earthquake that struck off El Salvador on August 27, 2012. Its rupture occurred within the subducting Cocos Plate beneath Central America.
North American Plate: A tectonic plate that carries most of North America and extends into the Atlantic and Arctic oceans. The Cocos Plate subducts beneath its margin off southern Mexico.
Cocos Ridge: A submarine volcanic ridge on the Cocos Plate, formed as the plate moved over the Galápagos hotspot. Its thick crust changes how the Cocos Plate subducts beneath Costa Rica.
Farallon Plate: An ancient oceanic plate that subducted beneath the Americas and fragmented as the Pacific basin evolved. The Cocos Plate is one of the oceanic plates that emerged from the Farallon Plate’s breakup.

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