Isla Guadelupe

GUAX

Prototype Remote System for the Plate Boundary Observatory

Isla Guadelupe is within the Pacific Plate, and clearly outboard of the continental crust of the borderland. CICESE, UNAVCO and SCIGN collaborated to install a GPS station whose data are being acquired through a state of the art ’VSAT’ satellite telemetry system.

This Mexican island lies too far from the mainland of the Baja Peninsula to allow regular radio telecommunications methods. Because of its position on the Pacific plate, the site is of strategic importance for the SCIGN array and for the upcoming Plate Boundary Observatory initiative. The island is clearly on the Pacific plate, and is well away from the influences of North American - Pacific Plate boundary motion. The island is considered to be seismically and volcanically quiescent, and it is also much closer to the California and coastal Baja Peninsula borderland than the next closest Pacific plate sites (in the Hawaiian islands).

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