Acoustically detected hydrocarbon plumes rising from 2‐km depths in Guaymas Basin, Gulf of California

Plumes extending nearly 1000 m from the 1500--2000 m deep seafloor of Guaymas Basin were detected from below the 23.5-kHz inverted echo-sounder of the Scripps Deep Two vehicle. Individual sound reflectors (bubbles or drops) rise at approximately 17 cm/s in one plume. The Deep Tow side scan records provide more information on the plumes' structure at the altitude of the vehicle (75 m), where some form multiple side scan targets, one 20 m across. Near-bottom 4-kHz profiles show that plumes overlie young fault traces associated with extensional faulting at the basin's spreading centers of outcrops of tilted beds beside strike-slip faults. We infer from analysis of the Deep Tow observations, field relationships, and knowledge of the geology of this basin that the plumes are made of light hydrocarbons, perhaps mainly methane, that emanate from seabed seeps. One of the acoustically detected plumes was at a spreading-axis hydrothermal field, which has many buoyant, acoustically transparent thermal plumes, some of which are rich in dissolved hydrocarbons.