[Sasnet] Fwd: [Amqua-announce] 2008 Rocky Mountain Friends of the Pleistocene

[bonnie.a.b.blackwell at williams.edu]

please contact the leaders for more info. 

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    Date: Sun, 15 Jun 2008 18:31:46 -0500
    From: AMQUA announcement list <amqua-announce at museum.state.il.us>
Reply-To: AMQUA announcement list <amqua-announce at museum.state.il.us>
 Subject: [Amqua-announce] 2008 Rocky Mountain Friends of the Pleistocene
      To: amqua-announce at museum.state.il.us


2008 Rocky Mountain Friends of the Pleistocene

September 6-8, 2008, Quaternary Happenings in the Overthrust Belt, 
Western Wyoming

Leaders: Jim McCalpin, Greg Warren, Al Jones

ATTRACTIONS: everybody knows the Quaternary of Wyoming, but mainly 
from the Yellowstone, Jackson Hole, and Wind River areas. Sure, these 
are great places. But there is another province here that nobody ever 
talks about: The Overthrust Belt. These fold-and-thrust ranges extend 
from Canada to Utah and (unlike the better-known Wyoming locales) are 
composed of Paleozoic and Mesozoic sedimentary rocks, rather than 
Precambrian crystalline rocks.

Does this make a difference? You bet. Although the climatic forcing 
during the Quaternary was the same as in those better-known areas, 
the geomorphic response of these sedimentary rock ranges was quite a 
bit different. Most of this is due to weakness of sedimentary rocks. 
For example, the ranges were glaciated, a bit, but glaciation in 
folded sedimentary rocks makes a suite of landforms and deposits more 
subtle than those in crystalline ranges. If you dont know what these 
look like, you better check them out.

Another thing that happens in sedimentary mountain ranges is 
landsliding. The Salt River Range probably has the highest density of 
landslides of any mountain range in the USA. So the sediment yield 
response to climate change is much greater than what you would get in 
a crystalline mountain range.

Finally, there is the Quaternary tectonics. Neogene east-west 
extension of the Overthrust Belt induced reactivation of Sevier-age 
thrust faults as normal faults. Todays topographic relief is the 
result of this process. But unlike the fault scarps found in most 
crystalline terranes, these arent where you would expect.

More details at http://www.geohaz.com/2008%20FOP%20Overthrust%20belt.htm


----- End forwarded message -----


_______________________________________________________________________________
Bonnie A.B. Blackwell, Ph.D., F.G.S.A., F.G.A.C.
Director, RFK Science Research Institute, 
Research Scientist, Williams College
_______________________________________________________________________________
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