The India-Asia collision is an outstanding smoking gun in the study of continental collision dynamics. How and when the continental collision occurred remains a long-standing controversy. Here we present two new paleomagnetic data sets from rocks deposited on the distal part of the Indian passive margin, which indicate that the Tethyan Himalaya terrane was situated at a paleolatitude of ∼19.4°S at ∼75 Ma and moved rapidly northward to reach a paleolatitude of ∼13.7°N at ∼61 Ma. This implies that the Tethyan Himalaya terrane rifted from India after ∼75 Ma, generating the North India Sea. We document a new two-stage continental collision, first at ∼61 Ma between the Lhasa and Tethyan Himalaya terranes, and subsequently at ∼53−48 Ma between the Tethyan Himalaya terrane and India, diachronously closing the North India Sea from west to east. Our scenario matches the history of India-Asia convergence rates and reconciles multiple lines of geologic evidence for the collision.

The ambiguous temporal relationship between the crustal clockwise rotation and the activity of block boundary strike‐slip faults of the southeastern edge of the Tibetan Plateau has led to an incomplete understanding of the Cenozoic tectonic evolution of Southeast Asia. Based on the Pleistocene paleomagnetic data of the present work and previous Paleogene and Pliocene paleomagnetic data form the south side of the Eastern Himalayan Syntaxis (EHS), we confirmed that the southern edge of the EHS experienced strong clockwise rotation with an average rotational rate of 3.20‐3.02°/Myr since the late Oligocene, indicating that the crustal clockwise rotation of the southeastern edge of the Tibetan Plateau was commenced no earlier than ∼25.7 ± 2.5 Ma. The block boundary strike‐slip faults of the southeastern edge of the Tibetan Plateau began their major activity phase since ∼28 Ma, which was significantly synchronous with the northward indentation of the Indian Plate and the West Burma Block into the Eurasia to form the EHS, but was earlier than the initial clockwise rotation of the southeastern edge of the Tibetan Plateau. These temporal relationships probably indicate that the northward indentation of the Indian Plate and West Burma Block into the Eastern Himalayan orogenic belt to form the EHS since ∼28 Ma should be the paramount inducement to the crustal clockwise rotation and promote the major activity of block boundary strike‐slip faults of the southeastern edge of the Tibetan Plateau.

When and how the collision between India‐Asia occurred continue to be debated. We report new paleomagnetic data (D_s = 158.8°, I_s = 7.8°, k_s = 81.3, α₉₅ = 5.1°, N = 11 sites) from limestone of the Zongpu Formation Member I in the Tingri, which indicate that the Tethyan Himalaya was situated at 3.9 ± 2.6°S during 62‐59 Ma. This implies that Greater India was ∼900 km and that Tethyan Himalaya did not break off from India, which left a ∼2,000 km Neo‐Tethys Ocean that challenges the prevailing hypothesis that the initial collision of India–Asia occurred during this period. The drift rate of the India plate, with an average rate of 160 ± 28 mm/a during 60‐50 Ma, implies that the northern margin (e.g., the Tingri, Gyangze, Gamba, and Zanskar areas) of Greater India almost simultaneously collided with Asia at ∼50 Ma, quasi‐synchronously, and closing the Neo‐Tethys Ocean.

The Ordovician–Silurian transition experienced severe, but enigmatic, glaciation, as well as a paradoxical combination of mass extinction and species origination. Here we report a large and fast true polar wander (TPW) event that occurred 450–440 million years ago based on palaeomagnetic data from South China and compiled reliable palaeopoles from all major continents. Collectively, a ~50˚ wholesale rotation with maximum continental speeds of ~55 cm yr⁻¹ is demonstrated. Multiple isolated continents moving rapidly, synchronously, and unidirectionally is less consistent with and plausible for relative plate motions than TPW. Palaeogeographic reconstructions constrained by TPW controlling for palaeolongitude explain the timing and migration of glacial centers across Gondwana, as well as the protracted end-Ordovician mass extinction. The global quadrature pattern of latitude change during TPW further explains why the extinction was accompanied by elevated levels of origination as some continents migrated into or remained in the amenable tropics.

The occurrence of aftershocks and geohazards (landslides, collapses, and debris flows) decreases with time following a major earthquake. The 12 May 2008 Wenchuan Earthquake in Sichuan, China, provides the opportunity to characterize the subsequent spatiotemporal evolution of geohazards. Following the 12 May 2008 Wenchuan Earthquake, the incidence of geohazards first increased sharply, representing a “post-earthquake effect”, before starting to decrease. We compared the spatial distribution of the area affected by vegetation damage (AVD) triggered by large and medium-scale geohazards (LMG). We studied the interval prior to the 12 May 2008 Wenchuan Earthquake (2001–2007), the co-seismic period (2008), and the post-earthquake interval (2009–2016) and characterized the trend of decreasing geohazards at a macro scale. In vegetated areas, geohazards often seriously damage the vegetation, resulting in pronounced contrasts with the surrounding surface in terms of color tone, texture, morphology, and Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) which are evident in remote sensing images (RSI). In principle, it is possible to use the strong positive correlation between AVD and geohazards to determine indirectly the resulting vegetation and to monitor its spatiotemporal evolution. In this study we attempted to characterize the process of geohazard evolution in the region affected by the 12 May 2008 Wenchuan Earthquake during 2001–2016. Our approach was to analyze the characteristics of areas with reduced vegetation coverage caused by LMG. Our principal findings are as follows: (i) Before the Wenchuan Earthquake (during 2001–2007), there was no evidence for a linear increase in the number of LMG with time; thus, the geological environment was relatively stable and the geohazards were mainly induced by rainfall events. (ii) The 12 May 2008 Wenchuan Earthquake was the main cause of a surge in geohazards in 2008, with the characteristics of seismogenic faults and strong aftershocks determining the spatial distribution of geohazards. (iii) Following the 12 May 2008 Wenchuan Earthquake (during 2009–2016) the incidence of geohazards exhibited an oscillating pattern of attenuation, with a decreasing trend of higher-grade seismic intensity. The intensity of geohazards was related to rainfall and seismogenic faults, and also to the number, magnitude and depth of new earthquakes following the 12 May 2008 Wenchuan Earthquake. Our results provide a new perspective on the temporal pattern of attenuation of seismic geohazards, with implications for disaster prevention and mitigation and ecological restoration in the areas affected by the 12 May 2008 Wenchuan Earthquake.