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Structural Analysis Of The Northwest Wind Mountain Quadrangle, New Mexico: Proterozoic Shearing To Cenozoic Brittle Faulting In The Burro Mountains, Jensen Kohl Angelloz

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Preliminary investigation of the Bullard Peak metamorphic series (BPMS) in the northwestern Wind Mountain quadrangle within the Burro Mountains of southwestern New Mexico suggests a possible previously unidentified shear zone, prompting detailed (1:12,000) geologic mapping and collection of structural data. The study area has a complex tectonic history, including 1) ~1.65 Ga metamorphism during accretion of the Mazatzal terrane to Laurentia’s southern margin; 2) ~1.4 Ga intrusion of Granite and Rhyolite Province granitoids; 3) significant uplift during the formation of the Ancestral Rockies (~300 Ma) and the Rocky Mountains (~70-50 Ma); and 4) inversion tectonics with reactivation of compressional faults …

Geology Of The Northern Alto Relex Area, Big Bend National Park, Brewster County, Texas, Robert Schoen

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Detailed, 1:12,000-scale geologic field mapping was conducted around Alto Relex in the northern Sierra Del Carmen Mountains in Big Bend National Park. Alto Relex is a prominent, near vertical, ~1000 foot-high fault-line scarp. Cretaceous rocks in the area were folded and faulted by Laramide compression, intruded by Tertiary sills and overprinted by high-angle normal faults from Basin and Range extension. During the Laramide Orogeny and Basin and Range extension, the underlying basement shear zone called, the Texas Lineament, was reactivated creating a transpressional and transtensional regimes. The general geology of this area was outlined by Moustafa (1988) working primarily from …

Geophysical Delineation Of Megaporosity And Fluid Migration Pathways For Geohazard Characterization Within The Delaware Basin, Culberson County, Texas, Jonathan David Woodard

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

ABSTRACT

Differential dissolution of gypsum karst within the Delaware Basin poses a significant threat to infrastructure that society depends on. The study area is located in Culberson County, Texas and traverses a distance of approximately 54 kilometers along RM 652 within the Gypsum Plain which is situated on the northern margin of the Chihuahua Desert and includes outcrops of Castile and Rustler strata that host karst geohazards. Regions of karst geohazard potential have been physically surveyed proximal to the study area in evaporites throughout the Castile Formation outcrop; minimal hazards, in comparison to the Castile Formation, have been documented in …

The Sequence Stratigraphic Context Of Mixed Basin Margin Evaporites In The Harrisburg Member Of The Permian Kaibab Formation, Northern Arizona And Southern Utah, Cole Hendrickson

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The Kaibab Formation is a mixed carbonate system including evaporites and siliciclastics deposited on a westward dipping epeiric carbonate ramp during the middle Permian in northern Arizona, southern Utah, and eastern Nevada. It consists of the Fossil Mountain Member deposited in open-marine conditions and the overlying Harrisburg Member deposited in restricted conditions. The Harrisburg Member includes facies and depositional environments ranging from open-marine shallow-subtidal wackestone - packstone, restricted subtidal dolomitic mudstone, dolomitic sandstone, peritidal oolitic grainstone as well as gypsum and red siltstones deposited in a sabkha environment.

Fourteen stratigraphic sections were measured across northern Arizona and southern Utah to …

Gravitational Study Of The Hastings Salt Dome And Associated Faults In Brazoria And Galveston Counties,Texas, Francis C. Okocha

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Salt domes are important geological structures because they are potential major hydrocarbon traps and have a profound effect on overlying strata in the subsurface. Over five hundred salt domes have been located on the United States Gulf Coast region, including the Hastings Salt Dome. Hastings Oil Field is located about 40.2 km (25 miles) southeast of Houston, Texas. The Hasting oil field was discovered in 1934 and it was considered the largest oil reserve on the Gulf Coast. Its peak production of 75,000 BOPD (barrels of oil per day) was recorded in 1977 and it had a cumulative production of …

Structural And Stratigraphic Reconstruction Of The Whiting Dome Salt Structure In Viosca Knoll-Mississippi Canyon, Gom, Using 3d Seismic Data, Matthew R. Worrell

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Understanding the complexities of salt tectonics is one of the most important factors regarding seismic interpretation of stratigraphy, structure, and geomorphology in the Gulf of Mexico. Evaluating the processes affecting recent mobilization of salt in the shallow, well-imaged section can help provide analogues for older, similar occurrences in the deeper section, thereby providing structural models for the autochthonous salt and its effect on stratigraphy and even potential timing and migration issues of hydrocarbons.

Progradation of delta front and shelf to slope transitional sediments has expulsed and emplaced an allochthonous salt structure (Whiting Dome) in the Viosca Knoll and Mississippi Canyon …

Basement And Cover Structural Analysis Along The Eagle River Gorge, Sawatch Range, Colorado, Kaitlin Lee Askelson

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The Sawatch Range within the Rocky Mountains of central Colorado exposes Paleoproterozoic basement and overlying Paleozoic sedimentary rocks with a complex history of ductile and brittle deformation.

The goal of this study is to conduct analyses of brittle structures that occur in the basement and cover units to determine geometric relationships between the structures, provide a detailed description of structures and refine a geologic history for structures along the basement-cover contact in the northeastern Sawatch Range along the Eagle River canyon and U.S. Highway 24 from Red Cliff to Gilman, Colorado. Paleoproterozoic basement rocks include the Cross Creek granite, diorites, …

Delineation Of Karst Geohazards Along Rm 652 Through The Use Of Ground Penetrating Radar: Culberson County, Texas, Aaron A. Eaves

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The Delaware Basin is the western member of the larger Permian Basin, and is located in the Trans-Pecos region of Texas and New Mexico. The Delaware Basin hosts significant evaporite karst geohazards throughout the Gypsum Plain of the Castile Formation, where geohazards of all scales form beneath and immediately adjacent to major infrastructure throughout the region, especially Ranch-to-Market 652, including geohazards ranging from small scale dissolution of road base, to large scale cave and sinkhole development. Gypsum sourced from the Castile and Rustler formations was used to create the road base of this RM652 , which meteoric waters have easily …

The Tuscaloosa Marine Shale: Geologic History, Depositional Analysis, And Exploration Potential, Jessica D. Pair

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The Tuscaloosa Marine Shale (TMS) was deposited across southern Louisiana and Mississippi during the Upper Cretaceous. The study focuses on a core region containing vast deposits of Cretaceous-aged sediments that have economic importance for oil and gas exploration. This region has been conventionally drilled for decades, focusing on the recovery of the Cretaceous hydrocarbons. Explorers within this region had traditionally targeted the massive sand units of the Lower and Upper Tuscaloosa Group while neglecting the middle Tuscaloosa Marine Shale unit. With the onset of unconventional drilling technology, new explorers to the region have begun to delineate the Tuscaloosa Marine Shale’s …