Java Trench

Java Trench, deep submarine depression in the eastern Indian Ocean that extends some 2,000 miles (3,200 km) in a northwest-southeast arc along the southwestern and southern Indonesian archipelago. It is located about 190 miles (305 km) off the southwestern coasts of the islands of Sumatra and Java, stretching eastward south of the western Lesser Sunda Islands. To the northwest the trench merges with a system of islands and continental shelves that eventually extend into the Ganges River delta. For about half its length, off of Sumatra, it is divided into two parallel troughs by an underwater ridge, and much of the trench is at least partially filled with sediments. Its slopes exceed 10° and descend to a maximum depth of 24,440 feet (7,450 metres), the deepest point in the Indian Ocean.

The Java Trench constitutes an extensive subduction zone, where the seafloor of the tectonic plate to the west is being forced under the stable plate to the east (there represented by the Sunda Shelf and the Sunda Island arc). It is an active volcanic and seismic zone. In 2004 a massive undersea earthquake (magnitude 9.1) centred off northwestern Sumatra at the northern limit of the trench displaced a section of the fault zone stretching northward for more than 600 miles (1,000 km). This triggered a large tsunami that inundated coastal areas throughout the Indian Ocean region and caused widespread death and destruction.