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Serpentinite in Franciscan Melange

View on map:37.799585°N 122.481047°W

Comments

Serpentinites along Baker Beach are exposed by landslides. There is a fault contact here juxtaposing serpentinite and sandstone.  Serpentinite is rock typically formed from water rising from subducted sediments along a subduction zone into the mantle and forming hydrous minerals.

Jack Crane

Description


Mélange

In geology, a mélange is a large-scale breccia, a mappable body of rock characterized by a lack of continuous bedding and the inclusion of fragments of rock of all sizes, contained in a fine-grained deformed matrix. The mélange typically consists of a jumble of large blocks of varied lithologies. Large-scale melanges formed in active continental margin settings generally consist of altered oceanic crustal material and blocks of continental slope sediments in a sheared mudstone matrix. The mixing mechanisms in such settings may include tectonic shearing forces, ductile flow of a water-charged or deformable matrix (such as serpentinite), sedimentary action (such as slumping, gravity-flow, and olistostromal action), or some combination of these. Some larger blocks of rock may be as much as 1 kilometre (0.62 mi) across. Smaller-scale localized mélanges may also occur in shear or fault zones, where coherent rock has been disrupted and mixed by shearing forces.

References

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