Faulting on the Volcanic Tableland, Owens Valley, California

The Volcanic Tableland, brittle surface of the 764,000 yr-old Bishop Tuff, documents extensive faulting in the northern Owens Valley, California, during the late Quaternary. The Tableland surface is cut by at least 226 fault scarps, with a total of 328 km of surface rupture. Scarps are lens-shaped rips in the surface of the Bishop Tuff, with vertical offsets of a few meters to 140 m and lengths up to several kilometers. The scarps have an average trend of N10°-20°W and dip steeply both to the east and west. The Tableland records at least 290 m of cross-valley extension in the last 764,000 yrs, at an average rate of at least 400 m/m.y., and a cumulative seismic moment of at least $$2.8 \cdot 10^{28}$$ dyne cm. The Volcanic Tableland lies astride what has been called the White Mountain seismic gap of the Eastern California-Central Nevada seismic zone. Seismic moment recorded on the Tableland can be used to estimate average recurrence interval of surface-rupturing earthquakes on the floor of the Owens Valley...