Historical surface faulting in the Basin and Range province, western North America: implications for fault segmentation

Rupture of the Pitáycachi Fault in the 1887Mw7.5 Sonora, Mexico earthquake (southern Basin‐and‐Range Province): Rupture kinematics and epicenter inferred from rupture branching patterns

“…The more recent geologic slip rate of the Pitáycachi fault since Quaternary time, on the other hand, has been only 0.02 mm/yr based on the estimated age of soils formed on alluvial surfaces displaced by the fault [Bull and Pearthree, 1988;Pearthree et al, 1990]. This rate is at the very lowest end of the normal fault slip rates documented across the Great Basin and the southern Basin-and-Range Province, which range over four orders of magnitude [McCalpin, 1995;dePolo and Anderson, 2000].…”

“…The segmented structure of the surface rupture is noticeable from the surface offset distribution as well as the rupture trace geometry. Such segmented ruptures are typical for large (M w > 7.0) historical earthquakes of the Basin-and-Range Nevada;1954 Fairview Peak, Nevada;or 1959 Hebgen Lake, Montana, earthquakes [Doser and Smith, 1989;dePolo et al, 1991;Zhang et al, 1999]. Similarly, the Santa Rita fault zone, located along the southeastern margin of the Tucson Basin in southeastern Arizona, is a late Pleistocene example of a segmented Basin-and-Range Province fault rupture with an estimated recurrence time of 100 ka and an estimated magnitude up to 7.3, which is based on the fault length of 58 km and scarp heights up to 7 m [Pearthree and Calvo, 1987].…”

“…On 3 May 1887, the largest historical earthquake of the southern Basin-and-Range tectonic-physiographic province occurred within this discontinuous fault array and produced the world's longest recorded normal fault surface rupture in historic time [dePolo et al, 1991;Yeats et al, 1997]. Field observations indicate that three first-order range-bounding normal faults (from north to south: Pitáycachi, Teras, and Otates; Figure 1) ruptured in this 1887 Sonoran earthquake [Suter and Contreras, 2002].…”

Evolution of vertical faults at an extensional plate boundary, southwest Iceland

“…The monoclines are all curved in map view, following the traces of the faults. If a segmented normal fault were to exist at some location in the subsurface and the segments were linked across the relay zone between them, the resultant fault trace would contain a bend, as is commonly seen along surface-breaking normal faults (dePolo et al, 1991;Machette et al, 1991;Zhang et al, 1991). If these linked fault segments were then to propagate up towards the surface, producing surface flexure above their upper tips, the resultant monocline should also be curved, as occurs at Thingvellir.…”

Field evidence for normal fault linkage and relay ramp evolution: the Kırkağaç Fault Zone, western Anatolia (Turkey)

“…These include the basin and range province (e.g. Crone & Haller, 1991;Dawers & Anders, 1995;dePolo, Clark, Slemmons, & Ramelli, 1991;Machette, Personius, Nelson, Schwartz, & Lund, 1991), the East African Rift system (Griffiths, 1980;Morley et al, 1990), Greece (Flotte, Plagnes, Sorel, & Benedicto, 2001;Hemelsdael & Ford, 2016;Jackson et al, 1982;Roberts & Jackson, 1991;Stewart & Hancock, 1991) and western Anatolia (Çiftçi & Bozkurt, 2007;Gürboğa, 2014). Hence, for gaining insight into the evolution of relay ramps, three types of modelling studies have been conducted (Figure 1): analogue (e.g.…”