Wasatch Mountains, Utah Thrust Faults and Folds

Sevier-Laramide Project:  Wasatch Mountains, Utah

See exposures of Sevier (Cretaceous) thrust faults and folds at Payson Canyon, Springville, Mt. Timpanogos, Salt Lake City, Strawberry River, Park City, Ogden Canyon, and Willard

Payson Canyon Thrust

Watch a drone flyover of the Payson Canyon thrust:  Watch on YouTube 

A thrust fault is mapped in Payson Canyon on the 1991 Nephi 30x60 geologic map, placing Cambrian through Mississippian strata against Pennsylvanian at this location. The map, however, shows the younger Pennsylvanian strata as being displaced over the older strata, which would be incorrect.  Either way, this is the only thrust fault exposed in the Mt. Nebo block, and is therefore of geologic interest.  Older maps showed thrusts on the southern side of Nebo, but more recent geologic maps have reinterpreted them as landslides and different strata.  The Charleston-Nebo thrust is buried on the east side of Nebo by Neogene volcanics.  40.002259, -111.704057

Springville Folds

The folds on the Wasatch mountain front at Springville, Utah, formed just above the Charleston-Nebo thrust.  The exposure is oblique to the strike of the folds, making the fold geometries difficult to see.  40.184098, -111.599937 

Watch a high-res drone video of these amazing folds:  Watch on YouTube

Mt. Timpanogos

A thrust fault and related structures are exposed in Grove Creek on the front side of Mt. Timpanogos at Pleasant Grove, Utah.  From Interim Geologic Map of the Provo 30 x 60 minute Quadrangle, Utah Geological Survey OFR-586.  By Costenius, Clark, King, and Ehler, 2011.

The thrust fault is just past the gray ridge in the distance.  I was not able to reach it on this rainy day.  40.391197, -111.696181

Cleavage in the limestones just above the thrust fault shows the direction of compression, E-W perpendicular to the cleavage planes.  40.389687, -111.696815

Willard Thrust Area

Geology of the Willard Canyon area.  The Willard Thrust in the upper right is a back-thrust in the Sevier belt, and is one of the only thrusts in this part of the belt that involves Proterozoic rocks.  From Geologic map of the Willard quadrangle, Box Elder County, Utah: McKean, A.P., Balgord, E.A., Yonkee, W.A., and Hiscock, A.I.: Utah Geological Survey Map 278DM, 2018

The Cambrian Tintic Quartzite sits on the Great Unconformity above the Proterozoic Farmington Canyon Complex. Exposure of the Greast Unconformity is significant because it indicates a great amount of total crustal uplift, in this case from the Sevier orogeny and Basin and Range horst uplift.  41.412552, -112.025738

Watch the flyover on YouTube

The Tintic Quartzite is a beautiful and fascinating coarse quartzitic sandstone that is popular in landscaping.  Geologists like me love it because it shows bedding, cross-bedding, and grain size changes that tell us about its depositional environments those hundreds of millions of years ago.

Ogden Canyon

The Willard Thrust is exposed at the west end of Pineview Reservoir in Ogden Canyon, Utah.  It places Proterozoic metamorphic rocks over Mississippian carbonates.  From Utah Geological Survey Open-File Report 653DM, 2016:  Interim Geologic Map of the Ogden 30'x60' Quadrangle.

Looking north over the west end of Pineview Reservoir, the Willard thrust Places Proterozoic rocks over the Mississippian Humbug Formation.  41.255811, -111.835413

Looking west at Pineview Reservoir, folds are exposed in the Mississippian rocks below the Willard Thrust.

Raymond Thrust at Salt Lake City

The Raymond thrust is exposed in the Olympus Cove area of eastern Salt Lake City.  Its two branches place various Paleozoic units against each other.  This location is unique because it is the northern side of the Uinta Arch, a younger Laramide east-west structure that tilted the older Sevier structures northward here.  Displacement on these faults was actually east-west, but the tilt created an east-west strike.  South from here, no Sevier faults or upper plate units are present until the south side of the Uinta Arch in American Fork Canyon.  Map from Bryant (1990), Geologic Map of the Salt Lake City 30 x 60 Quadrangle:  USGS Misc. Investigations Series Map I-1944.

View eastward of the Raymond Thrust splays.  40.677148, -111.776163

Watch a high-res drone video of the Raymond thrust on YouTube

Park City

At Kimball Junction, a thrust fault places the Permian Park City Formation over the Jurassic Thaynes Formation, shown below.  From USGS Misc. Investigations Series Map I-1944 (1990), Geologic Map of the Salt Lake City 30x60 Quadrangle Map, by Bruce Bryant.

Sevier thrust fault at Kimball Junction, Utah.  40.724583, -111.556672

On the hill on the east side of Park City, a thrust places the Pennsylvanian Weber Sandstone over the Triassic Woodside Formation, also shown below.  From USGS Misc. Investigations Series Map I-1944 (1990), Geologic Map of the Salt Lake City 30x60 Quadrangle Map, by Bruce Bryant.

Sevier thrust fault in the hill on the east side of Park City, Utah.  40.647543, -111.490967

 Sevier thrust fault in the hill on the east side of Park City, Utah.  

Charleston Thrust at Strawberry River

Along the Strawberry River north of Strawberry Reservoir, the easternmost exposure of the Charleston-Nebo thrust places Permian rocks over Triassic.

Watch high-res flyover on YouTube  40.351601, -111.226405

See more posts with the key words Sevier and/or Laramide.

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