The Three Kings Ridge, sometimes known as Three Kings Rise and more rarely at its southern end as the Three Kings Bank is a deep sea westward facing volcanic arc of Zealandia continental crust extending from northwest of Cape Reinga / Te Rerenga Wairua, New Zealand on a line bisecting New Caledonia and Fiji in the South Pacific Ocean. Its southern portion contains the Manawatāwhi / Three Kings Islands which have biological significance as they are host to unique species and important marine ecosystems. Geology The ridge along with its northern continuation, the Loyalty Ridge that extends north of New Caledonia, is now a relatively well studied, greater than long feature of Zealandia tectonics. It is a relatively rigid portion of continental crust compared to the oceanic crust in surrounding basins about in thickness. While regarded as inactive there have been moderate sized earthquakes at the northern end of the ridge. It can be regarded as a stranded western remnant arc segment split off by intra-arc and cross-arc rifting during back-arc basin opening from the still active eastern arc segments close to the Pacific trench and slab. The long Cook Fracture Zone that is aligned with the two ridges separates it from the Loyalty Ridge and is associated with about lateral displacement at the southern end of the central Minerva-Cook spreading zone of the South Fiji basin. In the middle of the area between the two ridges is the youngest dated volcanics, being the DR22A seamount at 19.7 ± 0.5 Ma. The northern deep tip of the ridge has mudstone at water depth that is stratigraphically dated to 20.9 to 18.7 Ma. To its east is the Norfolk basin separating it from the Norfolk Ridge in the Tasman Sea. To its west is the South Fiji Basin with its former spreading sea floor of the Cook Fracture Zone. To its south a trough extends from the Norfolk basin separating it from the volcanic alignment of the Norfolk Ridge with the northern North Island. It has been postulated that the Three Kings Ridge has been subsequently separated by the now inactive Vening Meinesz Fault Zone from the Miocene volcanic arcs of Northland in the North Island, and its extension under the Tasman Sea of the Northland Plateau. However, there is a distinct age difference between the 25 million years ago dates of the southern part of the ridge eruptives and the