Global Positioning System measurements at hundreds of stations in the region and earthquakes (blue The American physiographer N. M. Fenneman (1928, 1931) named the Basin and Range province and defined its general boundaries. The Great Basin is hemmed in on the west by the Sierra Nevada and on the east Line by the Rocky Mountains; it has no outlet to the sea. To conclude the Basin-and-Range section of this lecture, I leave you with a gorgeous National requires roughly 160,000 years of sustained stretching. The scale of source material is 1:2,500,000 and these data are not intended for use at a larger scale. Question 13 of 25 4.0/ 4.0 Points Where is Bogotá, Colombia's capital city, located? the Laramide ranges of Montana and Wyoming have been tectonically inactive for 30 million years the west. since 17 million years ago, when faults in the Nevada/Utah region first became active. alteration in the central and southern parts of the Basin and Range province of the United States. The Great Basin Section comprises the entire northern portion of the Basin and Range province. respectively by the Wasatch Fault along the western edge of the Wasatch Mountains of central Utah As thus circum- scribed, the province includes some 800,000 km2 of area in eight westem states. terms "horst" and "graben". Northwestern Basin and Range Section is located in the northern portion of Nevada, southeastern Idaho, and south-central Oregon. Basins and ranges. Lying mostly in Nevada and extending into California, Oregon, Idaho, and Utah, it is bordered by the Sierra Nevada on the west, the Columbia Plateau on the north, the Rocky Mts. The Basin and Range physiographic province refers to the arid to semiarid region in the western United States characterized by a landscape of quasi-parallel elongate ranges alternating with valleys floored by detritus. Figure 3 shows present-day activity in the Basin-and-Range region as indicated by very precise Salt-encrusted playas can be blinding occurs across the fault. In contrast, at the eastern edge of the Sierra Nevada Mountain Range. subducting along the entire west coast of North America. actively evolving part of the western landscape (if you doubt this, see Figure 3). you to pause in a future drive across the seemingly endless desert landscapes of Nevada and We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites. inland basin without any outlet to the ocean or sea. The Basin and Range Province is the other major desert region in the Southwestern United States. The Pahrump group of rocks in Death Valley and nearby Nevada contains limestone in which stromatolites may be found. The Basin-and-Range Province formed in response. Extension today in the southern areas of the Basin-and-Range is slow or inactive. across the central Basin-and-Range caused a series of normal faults to form in order to accommodate Due to its location near the These plates most likely exerted an eastward It is defined by unique basin and range topography, characterized by abrupt changes in elevation, alternating between narrow faulted mountain chains and flat arid valleys or basins. United States superimposed on earthquakes detected between 1964 and 2012 (self-generated image). central Basin-and-Range province). and how it influences the landscape of western California. The Intermountain West, or Basin and Range, the physical zone is immense. The alternation between mountain range and flat valley floor is caused by faults, which are fractures in the g… rate nor direction of the GPS sites changes very much until roughly central Nevada, where the This section is notable for its function as a "Great Basin", in that virtually no ground water escapes to the oceans. Both fault zones are still active, normal D. left lateral strike-slip This region covers the majority of Nevada and portions of Southern California, Utah, Arizona, New Mexico and the western tip of Texas. The ongoing activity makes the Basin and Range province one of the most seismically active regions in the United States. These data delineate the areal extent of the Basin and Range carbonate-rock aquifers as defined in the 'Ground Water Atlas of the United States' (U.S. Geological Survey HA 730). The Basin and Range Province located in the western United States is characterized by normal faults. 321B--Stockton Plateau. 1). The Basin and Range Province and Rio Grande Rift have National Park Service sites that showcase the landscape of an active continental rift zone in the western United States. it imposes a much different force on the interior of the North America plate than did the eastward-subducting northwest along its border with North America (the San Andreas fault). in Nevada, western Utah, and eastern California clearly indicate that the faults were born about The first of John McPhee's works in his series on geology and geologists, Basin and Range is a book of journeys through ancient terrains, always in juxtaposition with travels in the modern world―a history of vanished landscapes, enhanced by the histories of people who bring them to light. Figure 14. in the type of plate motion along the west coast of California at 17 Myr thus altered the forces in this region before and after 17 Myr. The Wasatch Fault consists of ten roughly 25-mile-long faults that collectively define a 240-mile-long As you can see from the map above and Figure 2 below, the Basin-and-Range province extends hundreds of Death Valley, California is the lowest of the basins with its lowest elevation of -282 feet (-86 m). III. They include granite as well as 1.7-billion-year-old metamorphic rocks such as gneiss, schist, and marble. Referring to Figures 4 and 5 below, east-to-west extension Question 12 of 25 4.0/ 4.0 Points Which of the following states contains territory located in the Basin and Range physical region? Geographic limits and present activity. Beginning in central Utah at locations immediately west of the Wasatch Fault (can you find the and the Sierra Nevada range-front fault of eastern California. Instead, the Pacific plate came into direct contact with the edge of the North America extension has doubled the original width of the central Basin-and-Range, which implies One could write volumes about the interesting features in the Great Basin (i.e. of the Univ. Before 17 Myr ago, a series of small oceanic plates were The region is dominated by mountain ranges that are separated by flat valley floors. the sites are located EAST of the Wasatch Fault and are therefore on stable areas of the North GPS site directions begin to rotate more toward the northwest and the site rates increase modestly. Basin and Range province - 17 Ma to present; Arizona to Mexico - some extension as early as 30 Ma, with major pulses at 24-23 Ma and 13-12 Ma. The basic topographic pattern of the Basin and Range extends from eastern California to central Utah, and from southern Idaho and Oregon into the state of Sonora in Mexico. Figure 3 also clearly shows that as one travels westward from the Wasatch Mountains, neither the At the heart of the province, Nevada ranks number three (tied with Hawaii) for most earthquakes greater than 5.0 in magnitude between 1973 and 2003 in the United States, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. the east-to-west stretching of the crust. a variety of salts that often color the playa white. Those sites therefore do not move since the North America plate is fixed in this The Basin and Range area of the western United States is one of the most desolate and yet intriguing regions of the continent. Playa in the Black Rock Desert and diagrams that illustrates As Figure 2 shows, the eastern and western edges of the central Basin-and-Range are defined oceanic plates before 17 Myr, namely, the Pacific plate moves slowly away from interior areas In central Utah at locations immediately west of the western United States is a rift-related orogeny Valley... 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