Relationships between thrusting and joint systems in the Jaca thrust-top basin, Spanish Pyrenees

Abstract

The Oligo-Miocene rocks of the West Jaca thrust-top basin and adjacent parts of the Ebro basin are cut by up to eight sets of joints and allied mesofractures. The fractures belong to three groups that can be distinguished on the basis of their relative ages and geometry. An older group of joints strikes normal or subnormal to the Pyrenean mountain front and is restricted to subareas (here called front-normal joint domains) coincident with the immediate footwalls of thrusts. Joints striking parallel to a buried lateral ramp characterize a lateral ramp joint domain. Younger joints striking parallel or subparallel to the mountain front occur throughout most of the West Jaca and Ebro basins, and define front-parallel joint domains. The joint domains appear to reflect the geometry and evolution of thrust sheets. Joints in front-normal domains were formed during stretching of footwalls as a result of their loading by overriding thrust sheets. Stretching above a lateral ramp is thought to be responsible for the development of joints in the lateral ramp domain. Joints in the front-parallel domains of the West Jaca basin are related to stretching in growth folds that were amplifying during salt doming. Front-parallel joints in the Ebro basin are attributed to stretching of a foreland basin sequence above a basement flexure related to thrust loading.