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Keystone Fault

Turtleback Peak, Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area, Las Vegas, Nevada, USA

 

The most significant geologic feature of Red Rock Canyon is the Keystone Thrust Fault. .... A thrust fault is a fracture in the earth's crust that is the result of compressional forces that drive one crustal plate over the top of another. This results in the oldest rocks on the bottom of the upper plate resting directly above the youngest rocks of the lower plate. At Red Rock Canyon, the gray carbonate rocks of the ancient ocean have been thrust over the tan and red sandstone in one of the most dramatic and easily identified thrust faults to be found. (www.redrockcanyonlv.org/GEOLOGY.htm)

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Uploaded on November 1, 2008
Taken on October 7, 2008