Pseudotachylyte-bearing strike-slip duplex structures in the Fort Foster Brittle Zone, S. Maine

Abstract

Detailed (1:60 scale) mapping of the Fort Foster Brittle Zone in the mylonitic Rye Formation of southernmost Maine has revealed the intricate internal duplex structure of a system of probable Paleozoic-age dextral strike-slip faults that have produced abundant pseudotachylyte and minor breccia. The internal configuration of this brittle zone consists of a mosaic of individual pseudotachylyte generation zones as slab-duplex structures. Individual duplex zones are up to 100 m in length and 1 m or less in width and are defined by pairs of layer-parallel slip surfaces along which frictional melts were produced. These slab-duplex structures are interpreted as zones of displacement transfer between long, overlapping, layer-parallel en échelon strike-slip fault surfaces. Contractional duplexes develop layer-parallel compressional structures that tend to shorten and thicken the fault-bounded slabs by the formation of lateral ramps and conjugate faults, kinks and asymmetric folds. Extensional duplexes develop layer-parallel stretching and thinning by the formation of oblique dextral shears, high-angle conjugate pairs and localized fault breccias. The production of pseudotachylyte by friction melting along layer-parallel fault surfaces in these exposures is attributed to rapid slip during paleoseismic events. The rupture structures developed during these events may be characteristic of fault structure and mechanics at near-focal depths in a strike-slip seismogenic zone.