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Damage zones around strike-slip fault systems and strike-slip fault evolution, Crackington Haven, southwest England

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Abstract

A well exposed outcrop of Upper Carboniferous greywackes and slates at Crackington Haven, north Cornwall, shows several episodes of strike-slip faulting. Exposure-scale structures display may features typical of strike-slip fault systems including: splay faults, wing cracks, jogs, fault bends, fault branches, λ faults, rotated blocks, together with layer-parallel slip, and deformation of the wall-rocks.

The strike-slip faults developed with a remote NNE-SSW trending maximum compressive principal stress (ϱ1). Interactions between anisotropic layering and faults with different orientations are important factors in controlling slip. Displacement (d)-distance (x) analysis indicates that variations in displacement gradient and the material anisotropy of the wall-rocks control the development and nature of damage structures.

The strike-slip fault system shows an evolving pattern from isolated faults through segmented faults to interacting faults, an analysis of which is supported by the maximum displacement (d max)-length (L) relationships for the fault population.

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  1. Geomechanics Research Group, School of Ocean and Earth Science, Southampton Oceanography Centre, University of Southampton, SO14 3ZH, Southampton, U.K.

    Young-Seog Kim & Jim R. Andrews

  2. TH Huxley School of Environment, Earth Sciences and Engineering, Imperial College, Royal School of Mines Building, Prince Consort Road, SW7 2BP, London, U.K.

    David J. Sanderson

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Kim, YS., Andrews, J.R. & Sanderson, D.J. Damage zones around strike-slip fault systems and strike-slip fault evolution, Crackington Haven, southwest England. Geosci J 4, 53–72 (2000). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02910127

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