HR: 08:30h
AN: V31G-03    [Abstracts]
TI: Long-term slip rates of the Elsinore-Laguna Salada fault, southern California, by U-series Dating of Pedogenic Carbonate in Progressively Offset Alluvial fan Remnants.
AU: * Fletcher, K E
EM: fletcher@eps.berkeley.edu
AF: University of California, Berkeley, Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, 307 McCone Hall, Berkeley, CA 94720-4767, United States
AU: Rockwell, T K
EM: tom.rockwell@geology.sdsu.edu
AF: San Diego State University, Department of Geological Sciences, 5500 Campanile Dr., San Diego, CA 92182-1020, United States
AU: Sharp, W D
EM: wsharp@bgc.org
AF: Berkeley Geochronology Center, 2455 Ridge Rd., Berkeley, CA 94709, United States
AB: The Elsinore-Laguna Salada (ELS) fault is one of the principal strands of the San Andreas fault system in southern California, however its seismic potential is often de-emphasized due to previous estimates of a low slip rate. Nevertheless, the fault zone has produced two historic earthquakes over M6, with the 1892 event estimated at >M7; thus further investigation of the long-term slip rate on the ELS fault is warranted. On the western slopes of the Coyote Mountains (CM), southwest Imperial Valley, a series of alluvial fans are progressively offset by the Elsinore fault. These fans can be correlated to their source drainages via distinctive clast assemblages, thereby defining measurable offsets on the fault. Dating of the CM fans (to compute slip rates), however, is challenging. Organic materials appropriate for C-14 dating are rare or absent in the arid, oxidizing environment. Cosmogenic surface exposure techniques are limited by the absence of suitable sample materials and are inapplicable to numerous buried fan remnants that are otherwise excellent strain markers. Pedogenic carbonate datable by U-series, however, occurs in CM soil profiles, ubiquitously developed in fan gravels, and is apparent in deposits as young as ~1 ka. In CM gravels 10's ka and older, carbonate forms continuous, dense, yellow coatings up to 3 mm thick on the undersides of clasts. Powdery white carbonate may completely engulf clasts, but is not dateable. Carefully selected samples of dense, innermost carbonate lamina weighing 10's of milligrams and analyzed by TIMS, are geochemically favorable for precise U-series dating (e.g., U = 1-1.5 ppm, median 238U/232Th ~ 7), and yield reproducible ages for coatings from the same microstratigraphic horizon (e.g., 48.2 ± 2.7 and 49.9 ± 2.2 ka), indicating that U-Th systems have remained closed and that inherited coatings, though present, have been avoided. Accordingly, U-series on pedogenic carbonate provides reliable minimum ages for deposition of host landforms, thereby facilitating determination of maximum bounds on corresponding slip rates. Results to date show that pedogenic carbonate dating in the CM has a useful range of at least 140 ka, thus progressively offset geomorphic surfaces in the CM study area afford the opportunity to examine the pattern of slip on the Elsinore fault over time scales from circa 10 to >100 ka.
DE: 1105 Quaternary geochronology
DE: 1115 Radioisotope geochronology
DE: 1120 Isotopic disequilibrium dating
SC: Volcanology, Geochemistry, Petrology [V]
MN: 2007 Fall Meeting