Abstract
Shallow-marine rocks exposed on the 2-km-high, 45-km-thick Colorado Plateau in the western United States indicate that it was near sea level during much of the Phanerozoic. Isostatic calculations, however, illuminate the difficulty in maintaining a 45-km-thick crust at or near sea level. We propose that an isostatically balanced, 30-km-thick, proto‐Colorado Plateau crust was thickened during the Late Cretaceous to early Tertiary by intracrustal flow out of an overthickened Sevier orogenic hinterland. This plateau would have been supported by a thick (>70 km) crustal root, which is proposed to have been the source region for hot and weak mid-crustal material that flowed eastward from the plateau toward the low-elevation proto‐Colorado Plateau.
Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a callDisclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.
