A hornblende-bearing basalt from Western Mexico: Water-saturated phase relations constrain a pressure-temperature window of eruptability

Trachybasalt scoria from a cinder cone near the Mexican volcanic front contain phenocrysts of olivine with chromite inclusions, apatite, augite and hornblende, with microphenocrysts of plagioclase. The water-saturated phase relations reproduce the phenocryst assemblage between 1040°C and 970°C with water contents of between 2·5 and 4·5% (50–150 MPa). The absence of biotite phenocrysts in the scoria places a tight constraint on the pressure–temperature conditions of phenocryst equilibration, as there is only a small zone where biotite does not accompany hornblende in the experiments. Diluting the fluid phase with CO2 changes the composition of the olivine, indicating that CO2 was only a minor component of the fluid of the scoria. Hornblende is stable to 1040°C at oxygen fugacities of NNO + 2 (where NNO is the nickel–nickel oxide buffer), but at lower oxygen fugacities, the upper limit is 990°C. There is a progressive increase in crystallinity in experimental runs as both pressure and temperature decrease. Isobaric plots of crystallinity show that the onset of hornblende crystallization involves a reaction relation, and also results in a marked ∼15–40 vol. % increase in crystallinity. Ascending hydrous magmas intersecting the cooler crust could be trapped there by the large increase in crystallinity accompanying the isobaric crystallization of hornblende.