Peru-Chile Trench
The Peru-Chile Trench is also known as the Atacama Trench. It is located in the Eastern Pacific Ocean about 100 miles off the coast of Peru and Chile. The trench reaches a depth is 26,460 feet below sea level and is about 3,666 miles long. Its average width is 40 miles and covers an expense of about 228,000 square miles. The Peru-Chile Trench is where the subduction Nazca Plate under the South American Plate lies. It lies offshore from an area of active volcanoes. The trench sediments are made of many things. There are turbidites, oceanic deposits, mainly clays, volcanic ash, and siliceous oozes. There are also some carbonates and sometimes dolomites. The study of those sediments shows the presence of metals in the lava that erupts from underwater volcanoes.