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Faults

Faults are breaks, or fractures, in rocks along which one side has moved relative to the other side. There are many kinds of faults, some of which are important as structural traps for petroleum in Kansas. Faulting, for example, is important to entrapment and migration of oil at Salina-Lindsborg fields in Saline County. The most common type of fault is the "normal fault' (fig. 6a). In this case, rocks along one side of the break simply drop down relative to the other side. An example is the Humboldt fault zone, a series of normal faults which can be traced from Nebraska southwestward across the state of Kansas along the east side of the Nemaha ridge. This happens when the Earth's crust is stretched. Figure 6a--Fractures in the Earth's crust along which movement has taken place are called "faults." Where one side of the fault is dropped down by gravity relative to the other side, it is called a "normal fault."

Another kind of fault occurs when one block of rock is faulted upward and over another. If the plane of the fault is steep, it is called a "reverse fault" (fig. 6b) and if it is low angle, it is called a "thrust fault" (fig. 6c). The fault at Salina-Lindsborg fields is a reverse fault, and the Humboldt fault zone includes some reverse faults. Reverse and thrust faults occur when the Earth's crust is compressed, or shortened. When this occurs, folds usually form first, only to break into thrust faults when the strength of the strata involved is exceeded by the compressional forces. Figure 6b--Where one side of the fault is pushed up and over the opposite side along a steep fracture, it is called a "reverse fault."

Figure 6c--A "thrust fault" occurs where a sheet of rock is forced up and over the opposite side of the fault along a low-angle break. Rocks are sometimes displaced many miles along large thrust faults.

We are only now learning that the most important kind of faulting is when one block of the Earth's crust is forced to move laterally (horizontally) in relation to the other side. Such faults, known technically as "strike-slip faults," and rather colloquially as "wrench faults," form when lateral stresses (twisting in the horizontal plane) act on large expanses of the Earth (fig. 6d). Wrench faults usually form in broad bands, or swarms of many faults, that may be tens of miles wide and hundreds of miles long. Such extreme friction occurs that the rocks literally are shattered along a wide path and movement occurs along dozens or perhaps hundreds of individual faults and drag folds. The many faults that are active today in southern California, the San Andreas and related faults, constitute a wrench-fault zone. In that case, the western, or seaward, block is moving northward relative to the eastern, or continental side along hundreds of active faults. Figure 6d--This block diagram of a wrench-fault zone shows that vertical movement is often very complex. Faults may appear to be normal or reverse along the fault zone, and fault reversals and scissoring are common; horizontal displacement is greater than these vertical complications.

Geologists are now finding numerous wrench-fault zones, especially in rocks of younger Precambrian age, on every continent, and the midcontinent of North America is no exception. Structures associated with the Central Kansas uplift occur in patterns and trends which resemble those involved in wrench-fault zones. The Midcontinent Rift System that

traverses from northeast to southwest across eastern Kansas is believed by some geologists to be an ancient, billion-year-old, wrench-fault zone.

Teacher Feature:

California Has Its Faults


From January/February 1992 issue of California Geology magazine A fault is a fracture along which there is movement. Some faults are actually composed of several fractures called fault branches. Collectively the branches are a fault zone (see map). California's diverse landscape and complex geology can be attributed to faulting. Many of the State's valleys, mountain ranges, and desert areas show the effects of faulting. Faults create underground traps in which valuable reservoirs of petroleum form, and spaces in which underground waters deposit valuable metals in the form of veins and masses of ore. Faults are distinguished by abrupt changes in rock structure or composition. Sometimes a fault can be recognized by the displacement of a particular feature such as a bed or a vein. The best places to observe faults are usually in roadcuts, quarries, and sea cliff exposures.

Fault Classification
Faults and fault zones are classified by how the rocks on each side of the fault or fault zone move past each other. There are two main types of movement along faults: 1) a sideways movement called strike slip, and 2) an up or down movement called dip slip. Strike-Slip Faults The movement along a strike-slip fault is approximately parallel to the strike of the fault, meaning the rocks move past each other horizontally. The San Andreas is a strike-slip fault that has displaced rocks hundreds of miles. As a result of horizontal movement along the fault, rocks of vastly different age and composition have been placed side by side. The San Andreas fault is a fault zone rather than a single fault, and movement may occur along any of the many fault surfaces in the zone. The surface effects of the San Andreas fault zone can be observed for over 600 miles (1,000 km). Dip-Slip Faults Dip-slip faults are faults on which the movement is parallel to the dip of the fault surface. Normal faults are dip-slip faults on which the hanging wall (the rocks above the fault surface) move down relative to the footwall (the rocks below the fault surface). Normal faults are the result of extension (forces that pull rocks apart). Where the dip of a normal fault's surface is steep, it is called a high-angle

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