--> ABSTRACT: Sedimentation in Detachment-Dominated Extensional Orogens: Examples from the Mojave Extensional Belt, California, by Christopher J. Travis, Roy K. Dokka; #90097 (1990).

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ABSTRACT: Sedimentation in Detachment-Dominated Extensional Orogens: Examples from the Mojave Extensional Belt, California

Christopher J. Travis, Roy K. Dokka

Recent studies of syntectonlc sedimentary rocks of the early Miocene Mojave Extensional Belt (MEB) provide new data on sediment dispersal within an evolving continental extensional orogen. Sediment dispersal within the MEB apparently reflects the evolution of the major tectonic elements of the belt. Sediments deposited in the breakaway zone of the Daggett terrane in the Newberry Mountains were derived from unextended regions to the southwest and from intraterrane tilted fault blocks to the northeast. Sediment dispersal patterns near transfer zones are typically perpendicular to extensional axes. In the Daggett terrane, coarse clastic materials were transported northwestward from unextended areas across the Kane Springs transfer fault into upper plate fault-bounded basins. Sequences accumulated in the hanging walls of upper plate tilted fault blocks exhibit geometries similar to those of breakaway zones, but show differences in thickness and textural attributes. Intraterrane arching is indicated by dispersal patterns in conglomerates of the central Cady Mountains in the Daggett terrane. Locally, detachment faulting may be succeeded by high-angle, normal faulting. In the Waterman terrane, this has resulted in relative uplift and the development of a metamorphic core complex in the Waterman Hills-Mitchell Range area. The uplift and unroofing history of the Waterman Hills is recorded in the thick deposits of the formation of Ross Canyon and the Barstow Formation of the Mud Hills.

AAPG Search and Discovery Article #90097©1990 Fifth Circum-Pacific Energy and Mineral Resources Conference, Honolulu, Hawaii, July 29-August 3, 1990