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The AAPG/Datapages Combined Publications Database

Pacific Section of AAPG

Abstract


Structural Geology of the Sacramento Basin: 1992 Pacific Section Annual Convention, 1992
Pages 155-155

Late Cenozoic Blind Thrusting and Transpressional Kinematics, Potrero Hills Region, Sacramento - San Joaquin Delta, California

Scott Hector, Jeff Unruh

Abstract

The Potrero Hills is an east-west trending, asymmetric anticline along the northern margin of the Sacramento-San Joaquin delta region. Structural analysis using correlated electric log and dipmeter data indicates that the Potrero Hills is a fault-bend or fault-propagation fold underlain by a system of blind north-vergent thrusts. The thrusts ramp up to the north from an inferred detachment in Upper Cretaceous and/or Paleogene strata. Younger thrust imbricates have formed by ramping through the hanging walls of older imbricates. Most of the shortening has been accommodated by the Paleocene Martinez shale. Minimum structural relief is approximately 1030 m. Pliocene strata are folded on both limbs, indicating that at least some of the shortening has occurred during the late Cenozoic. East-west clusters of microseismicity in the Potrero Hills region suggest that deformation is actively occurring there.

Northwest-trending Quaternary folds and active seismicity indicate that the Western Great Valley is underlain by a system of northeast-vergent blind thrusts. The east-west strike of the Potrero Hills and northward vergence of thrusting are clearly anomalous compared to regional trends. Speculatively, the Potrero Hills may represent shortening at the northward termination of a system of north-trending strikeslip faults. The Potrero Hills may represent a restraining left step in the transfer of right-slip from the northtrending faults southeast of the delta to active strikeslip faults northwest of the delta.


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