HOT FLUID MIGRATION - AN EFFICIENT SOURCE OF GROUND DEFORMATION - APPLICATION TO THE 1982-1985 CRISIS AT CAMPI FLEGREI-ITALY

Some solutions of the forced heat advection problem in compressible media are worked out employing a perturbative approach and their implication for thermoelastic deformation are discussed. A sharp temperature front, which migrates at a speed in the order of Darcy flow rate, develops in the medium, giving rise to significant deformation via thermal expansion. A thermally induced pressure source accompanies the temperature front, which may be significant only in very high temperature cases. Results are applied to interpreting the uplift episode of 1982-1984 at Campi Flegrei (C.F.), near Naples, Italy. A mechanism is envisaged for uplift at Campi Flegrei in which a sudden connection is established between a deep, hot, high-pressure fluid reservoir and a shallow, relatively cold, low-pressure aquifer. The inclusion of fluid migration in the deformation model allows simple explanations of several geochemical and geophysical observations made during the bradyseismic crisis. It appears that the proposed mechanism may explain the large observed uplift, without requiring unreasonable pressure increase within the magma chamber. Furthermore, the deformation source may be allowed to be shallower than the magma chamber, as required by any reasonable deformation model at C.F.