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Structure of the Mesozoic Marietta-Tryon graben, South Carolina and adjacent North Carolina

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Basement Tectonics 8

Part of the book series: Proceedings of the International Conferences on Basement Tectonics ((ICBT,volume 2))

Abstract

The Marietta-Tyron graben is a system of 21 brittle faults, cataclastic zones, and lineaments in the Piedmont of South Carolina and adjacent North Carolina, developed as part of a broad zone of crustal deformation during Mesozoic continental rifting. Sinistral normal-oblique movements dominate the N50°-70°E fault system; dextral normal-oblique movements, possibly younger, also occur along three ENE-trending faults. Recurrent, incongruous movements are suggested by scatter in regional slickenline data; nonetheless, the mean vector orientations for slickenlines from each fault zone are remarkably consistent, produced by a strong strike-slip component of oblique slip. A complex Mesozoic brittle history superimposed on Paleozoic folding, metamorphism, magmatism, and jointing is recorded also in the multiple shearing and quartz veinfilling textures of fault-related, siliceous cataclastic rocks.

Locally, Late Triassic-Early Jurassic(?) diabase (dolerite) dikes are sinistrally strike-separated several hundred meters across brittle faults. Positioning and steep attitudes of the faults likely are structurally inherited from a northeasterly regional joint set.

Conjugate zeolite/epidote-coated brittle shears in bedrock gneiss and drusy quartz extension fractures in cataclastic rocks indicate that dilational opening, oblique (<90°) to the N60°E fault trend, operated during at least the later stages of development of the graben. Regional extension oriented S35°-45°E may be responsible for the sinistral normal-oblique longitudinal shearing experienced by all faults and many nearby joints of the system.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Geology, Furman University, Greenville, South Carolina, 29613, USA

    John M. Garihan & William A. Ranson

Authors
  1. John M. Garihan
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  2. William A. Ranson
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Earth Sciences and Resources Institute, University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC, USA

    Mervin J. Bartholomew

  2. Department of Geology, University of Montana, Missoula, MT, USA

    Donald W. Hyndman

  3. Department of Earth Sciences, Montana State University, Bozeman, MT, USA

    David W. Mogk

  4. Department of Geological Sciences, Queen’s University, Kingston, Ontario, Canada

    Robert Mason

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© 1992 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht

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Garihan, J.M., Ranson, W.A. (1992). Structure of the Mesozoic Marietta-Tryon graben, South Carolina and adjacent North Carolina. In: Bartholomew, M.J., Hyndman, D.W., Mogk, D.W., Mason, R. (eds) Basement Tectonics 8. Proceedings of the International Conferences on Basement Tectonics, vol 2. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-011-1614-5_36

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-011-1614-5_36

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht

  • Print ISBN: 978-94-010-4703-6

  • Online ISBN: 978-94-011-1614-5

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