Tectonic history of the Chihuahua trough, Mexico and adjacent USA, Part II: Mesozoic and Cenozoic

Abstract

The Chihuahua trough is a right-lateral pull-apart basin that began to form ~159 to ~156 Ma (Oxfordian) during a period of relative counterclockwise rotation of the North American plate. Jurassic seas were well established by latest Oxfordian time and there was little change in basin configuration throughout the remainder of Late Jurassic, Neocomian and Aptian time. Elements of a broad zone of intersecting pre-existing northwest-trending and north-trending lineaments, along the southwest border of the North American craton, provide the fabric for development of the pullapart basin between the Diablo and Aldama platforms. During Tithonian and Neocomian time sedimentation eventually outpaced tectonic subsidence and, as an ensuing "regressive" event commenced, the eastern area of the Chihuahua trough was the locus of extensive evaporite (including halite) deposition. Near the end of Aptian time, during deposition of the Cuchillo and equivalent formations, faulting along the margins of the Chihuahua trough ceased and the seas began to transgress onto adjacent platform areas. By middle Albian time seas had advanced onto previously emergent areas and the Chihuahua trough became a site of shallow-water carbonate deposition that prevailed, with minor interruptions, until early Cenomanian time. The Ojinaga Formation (early Cenomanian -Santonian?) records a marine clastic influx into the Chihuahua trough, coeval with Upper Cretaceous clastic wedges in the Western Interior Cretaceous Seaway of the United States. Retreat of the Cretaceous sea is reflected in the transition from marine to non-marine beds in the Santonian San Carlos Formation and overlying non-marine El Picacho Formation.During the Laramide orogeny (84 to 43 Ma) the Chihuahua trough was inverted to form the Chihuahua tectonic belt. Laramide deformation is the result of left-lateral transpressional tectonics involving renewed movement along the pre-existing fabric that controlled the location of the Jurassic-Aptian basin. In the evaporite basin portion of the trough (eastern area) reactivation of basin-boundary-faults as Laramide reverse faults, with possible left-lateral components of motion, accompanied by development of gentle "ancestral" folds, was followed by amplification of folds in postevaporite rocks caused by flow of evaporites toward the crests of anticlines. As deformation progressed, structural development involved thrust faulting (principally toward the Diablo Platform) and diapiric injection of evaporites along the margins of the evaporite basin. In the northwestern area of the trough, structure reflects northeast-southwestoriented compression and includes relatively minor southwest-directed thrusting toward and onto the Jurassic Aldama platform. Paleozoic formations are involved in the thrusts and all thrusting can be interpreted as a consequence of faulted basement rather than regional-scale décollement.Post-Laramide tectonic activity includes a continuation of evaporite tectonism, scattered igneous intrusion, minor volcanism, gravity ...

The Boquillas Formation of the Big Bend National Park, Texas, USA, a reference Cenomanian through Santonian (Upper Cretaceous) carbonate succession at the southern end of the Western Interior Seaway

“…Many of these features continued to be present during the mid-Cretaceous. The Chihuahua Trough became a more prominent feature with the deeper part of the trough migrating eastward near the end of the Jurassic (Goldhammer 1999;Haenggi 2002). This may have been the result of the shallowing subduction zone of the Farallon Plate relative to the North American Plate or eastward migration of the Alisitos/ Cordilleran Island Arc System located to the west (Text- fig.…”

Síntesis de los trabajos paleobotánicos del Cretácico en México

“…Según Ramírez y Acevedo (1957) esta formación representa facies lagunares y depósitos cercanos a la costa con transgresiones marinas. Haenggi (2002) añadió que existió un desarrollo local de sabkhas. La Formación Benigno suprayacente fue descrita en el Arroyo Benigno en la parte oeste de la Sierra de los Fresnos por Nichols (1958), sin embargo, no estableció esta sección como localidad tipo, por lo que Monreal y Longoria (1999) propusieron otra sección tipo diferente.…”

Depositional systems of the late Eocene Yolomécatl Formation, northwestern Oaxaca, southeastern Mexico: a first approach

“…This major structure influenced deposition and emplacement of Paleogene sedimentary and magmatic units; further, very few basins with a like tectonic setting have been described in México, e.g. the Ixtapa Basin, Chiapas (Ferrusquía-Villafranca, 1996;Mandujano-Velázquez and Keppie, 2009), and the Chihuahua Trough (Haenggi, 2002). b) Paleontology: It bears the southernmost Paleogene vertebrate fauna of North America (Jiménez-Hidalgo et al, 2015), which is fairly diverse and occupied a tropical/subtropical environment (as disclosed by the fauna and flora recovered from this unit).…”