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Geology of Death Valley, California

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Geology of Death Valley, California

IN PHOTOS

Death Valley’s definitely one of my very favorite places, as a geologist and as a photographer. It’s been that way since I first started visiting regularly in 1984. The stark landscape, the incredible variety of rock types and ages, the light… there is so much variety and abundance of geological features that I always see new things. Here is a selection of 20 images that show some of the region’s most amazing geology.

Death Valley salt pan from Dantes View

Death Valley salt pan, Califoria

View of Death Valley salt flats (salt pan) and alluvial fans from Dantes View. (Dep-19)
Death Valley Salt Pan at Sunrise

Death Valley Salt Pan at Sunrise

Death Valley's salt flats and teepee structure. Most of the salt is haltite, although other evaportie minerals are present along the edges. (5D-1325)
Playa Scraper at Racetrack Playa

Playa scraper, Racetrack Playa, CA.

At Racetrack Playa, in the northern part of Death Valley National Park, numerous large rocks, such as this one, lie at the end of long trails, obviously carved out by the rock. The trails form very unusual patterns in some places. Most researchers now agree that the tracks form when sheets of ice on the playa begin to melt and drift, pushing the rocks in the process. M-05.
Dust Storm on playa

Dust storm, Mojave Desert, California

Dust and sand storms in the Death Valley region occur frequently over playas and dunes. Wind is an important transporting agent for fine grained material on alluvial fans.
Flood Damage at Zabriskie Point

Effects of flash flood

In 2004, a flash flood swept down Furnace Creek Wash in Death Valley National Park, tearing up the state highway and destroying the structures in and around the Zabriskie Point area. Such flash floods are relatively common, as most rainfall tends to run off into channels instead of soak into the ground. This particular flood was especially severe though because the rain fell in small area over a short amount of time.
Spring flower bloom in Death Valley

Spring flower bloom in desert

Death Valley National Park sometimes has terrific spring wildflower displays if the conditions are right. That is, if there is plenty of rainfall in the winter months and then it warms up quickly in the spring. Notice how the flowers congregate in the channels on the alluvial fan. (M-13)
Alluvial fan

Alluvial fan, Death Valley, CA

Aerial view of alluvial fan at Badwater, Death Valley National Park, California. (9A89-21; Dep-03)
Eureka Sand Dunes

Sand Dunes. Eureka Dunes, SE Cal.

Death Valley National Park contains at least 5 different dune fields: those shown here in the Eureka Valley are the tallest in California. (Dep-12)
Ripples and dunes, SE California

Star Dune at Sunset

Where wind direction tends to vary a lot, star dunes, with arms that reach out in all directions, may form. Death Valley National Park, California (Dep-15)
Phreatic explosion craters. Little Hebe Craters, Death Valley,

Phreatic explosion craters. Death Valley, CA

Aerial view of Ubehebe Craters, a small field of some 13 phreatic explosion craters, the largest of which is Ubehebe Crater itself. These craters formed when rising basaltic magma encountered groundwater and flashed to steam. (Ig-108).
Badwater Spring and fault scarp

Desert spring along fault, Death Valley

Badwater Spring issues from a recently active fault along the front of the Black Mountains, visible as two fault scarps in the background on the alluvial fan (G-04)
Black Mtns with Copper Canyon Turtleback

Black Mtns., Death Valley, CA, showing range-bounding fault and

The green-colored, rounded part of the mountain front in the foreground of this picture is underlain by metamorphic rock of the Copper Canyon Turtleback. Separating this rock from the red and tan rock above it is the Copper Canyon Turtleback fault, a large low-angle normal fault (next photo). Note the presently active frontal fault zone that marks the western edge of the Black Mountains.
Copper Canyon Turtleback fault

Low angle normal fault (detachment fault), Death Valley, CA

The Copper Canyon Turtleback is one of three so-called "turtlebacks" in the Black Mountains, named because their curving shapes resemble the backs of turtles. They consist of a core of ductiley deformed metamorphic basement rock (the greenish rock in the foreground), and "upper plate" of brittley faulted sedimentary or volcanic rock (reddish rock in the middleground), and a low-angle normal fault between them. (SrF-08)
Normal faults in marble. Mosaic Canyon

Conjugate normal faults in marble.

Conjugate normal faults in marble of Noonday Dolomite, Death Valley National Park, California.
Angular Unconformity at Ryan

Angular unconformity, Death Valley, CA.

This unconformity shows 4 Ma Funeral basalt overlying Artist Drive Fm (left) faulted against tilted Furnace Creek Fm (right). The 1920's era mining camp of Ryan sits on the hills just below the unconformity. This area has been the site of underground and strip mining of borate minerals. (Image ID# SrU-23)
Pegmatite intruding Precambrian Gneiss

Pegmatite intruding Gneiss

Pegmatite intruding Precambrian Gneiss as a dike (left side) and sill (middle). Death Valley National Park, California. Ig-08.
Aerial View of Titus Canyon Anticline

Overturned anticline, Death Valley, CA.

Aerial view of Titus Canyon Anticline, Death Valley National Park, California. This mountain-scale fold is an overturned anticline--the oldest rock lies in the core. Prominent dark red cliffs on right side made of Cambrian Zabriskie Quartzite; younger Carrara Formation makes brownish clffs to left. At the level of the canyon bottom, note how the rock is overturned. SrD-10.
Diabase sills (green) in limestone, SE Cal.

Diabase Sills, Mojave Desert, California

The green-colored rock in this photo is a 1 billion year old intrusion called diabase (chemically similar to basalt). Because it intrudes parallel to the layering in the country rock, it is called a sill. The country rock is the Proterozoic Crystal Spring Formation. Throughout the Death Valley region, talc deposits formed at the contact of the diabase sills and dolomite of the Crystal Spring Formation. Death Valley National Park. (Ig-21)

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