Eastern rim of the Chesapeake Bay impact crater: Morphology, stratigraphy, and structure

Special Paper of the Geological Society of America
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Abstract

This study reexamines seven reprocessed (increased vertical exaggeration) seismic reflection profiles that cross the eastern rim of the Chesapeake Bay impact crater. The eastern rim is expressed as an arcuate ridge that borders the crater in a fashion typical of the "raised" rim documented in many well preserved complex impact craters. The inner boundary of the eastern rim (rim wall) is formed by a series of raterfacing, steep scarps, 15-60 m high. In combination, these rim-wall scarps represent the footwalls of a system of crater-encircling normal faults, which are downthrown toward the crater. Outboard of the rim wall are several additional normal-fault blocks, whose bounding faults trend approximately parallel to the rim wall. The tops of the outboard fault blocks form two distinct, parallel, flat or gently sloping, terraces. The innermost terrace (Terrace 1) can be identified on each profile, but Terrace 2 is only sporadically present. The terraced fault blocks are composed mainly of nonmarine, poorly to moderately consolidated, siliciclastic sediments, belonging to the Lower Cretaceous Potomac Formation. Though the ridge-forming geometry of the eastern rim gives the appearance of a raised compressional feature, no compelling evidence of compressive forces is evident in the profiles studied. The structural mode, instead, is that of extension, with the clear dominance of normal faulting as the extensional mechanism. 

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Publication type Article
Publication Subtype Journal Article
Title Eastern rim of the Chesapeake Bay impact crater: Morphology, stratigraphy, and structure
Series title Special Paper of the Geological Society of America
DOI 10.1130/0-8137-2384-1.117
Issue 384
Year Published 2005
Language English
Contributing office(s) Woods Hole Coastal and Marine Science Center
Description 14 p.
Larger Work Type Article
Larger Work Subtype Journal Article
Larger Work Title Special Paper of the Geological Society of America
First page 117
Last page 130
Country United States
Other Geospatial Chesapeake Bay
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