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Death Valley, CA
Death Valley is a desert valley in Eastern California, in the northern Mojave Desert, bordering the Great Basin Desert. During summer, it is the hottest place on Earth. Death Valley's Badwater Basin is the point of lowest elevation in North America, at below sea level. It is east-southeast of Mount Whitney — the highest point in the contiguous United States, with an elevation of 14,505 feet (4,421 m). On the afternoon of July10, 1913, the United States Weather Bureau recorded a high temperature of 134 °F (56.7 °C) at Furnace Creek in Death Valley, which stands as the highest ambient air temperature ever recorded on the surface of the Earth. This reading, however, and several others taken in that period are disputed by some modern experts. Lying mostly in Inyo County, California, near the border of California and Nevada, in the Great Basin, east of the Sierra Nevada mountains, Death Valley constitutes much of Death Valley National Park and is the principa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
United States Geological Survey
The United States Geological Survey (USGS), formerly simply known as the Geological Survey, is a scientific agency of the United States government. The scientists of the USGS study the landscape of the United States, its natural resources, and the natural hazards that threaten it. The organization's work spans the disciplines of biology, geography, geology, and hydrology. The USGS is a fact-finding research organization with no regulatory responsibility. The agency was founded on March 3, 1879. The USGS is a bureau of the United States Department of the Interior; it is that department's sole scientific agency. The USGS employs approximately 8,670 people and is headquartered in Reston, Virginia. The USGS also has major offices near Lakewood, Colorado, at the Denver Federal Center, and Menlo Park, California. The current motto of the USGS, in use since August 1997, is "science for a changing world". The agency's previous slogan, adopted on the occasion of its hundredt ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Amargosa Range
The Amargosa Range is a mountain range in Inyo County, California and Nye County, Nevada. The range runs along most of the eastern side of California's Death Valley, separating it from Nevada's Amargosa Desert. The U-shaped Amargosa River flows clockwise around the perimeter of the range, ending below sea level in the Badwater Basin. The mountain range is named after the Amargosa River, so-named for the Spanish word for bitter because of the bitter taste of the water. In order from north to south, the Grapevine Mountains (including the range's highest point, Grapevine Peak), the Funeral Mountains, and the Black Mountains form distinct sections. Many of Death Valley National Park's most well-known features, such as Zabriskie Point Zabriskie Point is a part of the Amargosa Range located east of Death Valley in Death Valley National Park in California, United States, noted for its erosional landscape. It is composed of sediments from Furnace Creek Lake, which dried up 5 m ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Garlock Fault
The Garlock Fault is a left-lateral strike-slip fault running northeast–southwest along the north margins of the Mojave Desert of Southern California, for much of its length along the southern base of the Tehachapi Mountains. Geography Stretching for , it is the second-longest fault in California, and one of the most prominent geological features in the southern part of the state. It marks the northern boundary of the area known as the Mojave Block, as well as the southern ends of the Sierra Nevada and the valleys of the westernmost Basin and Range province. The Garlock Fault runs from a junction with the San Andreas Fault in the Antelope Valley, eastward to a junction with the Death Valley Fault Zone in the eastern Mojave Desert. It is named after the historic mining town of Garlock, founded in 1894 by Eugene Garlock and now a ghost town. Relatively few communities lie directly along the Garlock, as it is primarily situated in the desert, with Frazier Park, Tehachapi, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Furnace Creek Fault
The Furnace Creek Fault Zone (FCFZ) is a Fault (geology), geological fault that is located in Eastern California and southwestern Nevada. The right lateral-moving (dextral) fault extends for some between a connection with the Death Valley Fault Zone in the Amargosa Valley and northward to a termination in the Fish Lake Valley of southwest Nevada. The northern segment of the FCFZ is also referred to as the Fish Lake Valley Fault Zone. The FCFZ is considered an integral part of the Walker Lane. References Additional readingBaucke, W.; Cemen, I., ''Strike-Slip displacement along the Furnace Creek Fault Zone, southern Basins and Ranges, Death Valley, California,'' American Geophysical Union, Fall Meeting 2007, abstract #T31C-0594 Amargosa Desert Death Valley National Park Geology of Inyo County, California Natural history of Inyo County, California Natural history of Nye County, Nevada Natural history of the Mojave Desert Seismic faults of California Seismic faults of Nevada ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Death Valley Fault
The Death Valley Fault Zone (DVFZ) is a right lateral-moving (dextral) geologic fault in eastern California. It runs from a connection with the Furnace Creek Fault Zone in the Amargosa Valley southward to a junction with the Garlock Fault. It is considered an integral part of the Walker Lane The Walker Lane is a geologic trough roughly aligned with the California/Nevada border southward to where Death Valley intersects the Garlock Fault, a major left lateral, or sinistral, strike-slip fault. The north-northwest end of the Walker La .... External linksUSGS Database: Death Valley Fault Zone [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Strike Slip Fault
In geology, a fault is a planar fracture or discontinuity in a volume of rock across which there has been significant displacement as a result of rock-mass movements. Large faults within Earth's crust result from the action of plate tectonic forces, with the largest forming the boundaries between the plates, such as the megathrust faults of subduction zones or transform faults. Energy release associated with rapid movement on active faults is the cause of most earthquakes. Faults may also displace slowly, by aseismic creep. A ''fault plane'' is the plane that represents the fracture surface of a fault. A ''fault trace'' or ''fault line'' is a place where the fault can be seen or mapped on the surface. A fault trace is also the line commonly plotted on geologic maps to represent a fault. A ''fault zone'' is a cluster of parallel faults. However, the term is also used for the zone of crushed rock along a single fault. Prolonged motion along closely spaced faults can blur the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Walker Lane
The Walker Lane is a geologic trough roughly aligned with the California/Nevada border southward to where Death Valley intersects the Garlock Fault, a major left lateral, or sinistral, strike-slip fault. The north-northwest end of the Walker Lane is between Pyramid Lake in Nevada and California's Lassen Peak where the Honey Lake Fault Zone, the Warm Springs Valley Fault, and the Pyramid Lake Fault Zone meet the transverse tectonic zone forming the southern boundary of the Modoc Plateau and Columbia Plateau provinces. The Walker Lane takes up 15 to 25 percent of the boundary motion between the Pacific Plate and the North American Plate, the other 75 percent being taken up by the San Andreas Fault system to the west. The Walker Lane may represent an incipient major transform fault zone which could replace the San Andreas as the plate boundary in the future. The Walker Lane deformation belt also accommodates nearly 12 mm/yr of dextral shear between the Sierra Nevada– ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Trough (geology)
In geology, a trough is a linear structural depression that extends laterally over a distance. Although it is less steep than a trench, a trough can be a narrow basin or a geologic rift. These features often form at the rim of tectonic plates. There are various oceanic troughs on the ocean floors. Examples of oceanic troughs * Benue Trough * Cayman Trough * Kings Trough * Hesperides Trough * Nankai Trough * Northumberland Trough * Okinawa Trough in the East China Sea * Rockall Trough and others along the rift of the mid-oceanic ridge * Salton Trough * South Shetland Trough * Suakin TroughDinwiddie, Robert et al. (2008) ''Ocean: The World's Last Wilderness Revealed'', London, Dorling Kindersley, page 452. in the Red Sea * Timor Trough See also * Walker Lane * Oceanic basin In hydrology, an oceanic basin (or ocean basin) is anywhere on Earth that is covered by seawater. Geologically, ocean basins are large geologic basins that are below sea level. Most ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Graben
In geology, a graben () is a depressed block of the crust of a planet or moon, bordered by parallel normal faults. Etymology ''Graben'' is a loan word from German, meaning 'ditch' or 'trench'. The word was first used in the geologic context by Eduard Suess in 1883. The plural form is either ''graben'' or ''grabens''. Formation A graben is a valley with a distinct escarpment on each side caused by the displacement of a block of land downward. Graben often occur side by side with horsts. Horst and graben structures indicate tensional forces and crustal stretching. Graben are produced from parallel normal faults, where the displacement of the hanging wall is downward, while that of the footwall is upward. The faults typically dip toward the center of the graben from both sides. Horsts are parallel blocks that remain between graben; the bounding faults of a horst typically dip away from the center line of the horst. Single or multiple graben can produce a rift valley. Half-g ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
California Pleistocene Lakes USGS
California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the most populated subnational entity in North America and the 34th most populous in the world. The Greater Los Angeles area and the San Francisco Bay Area are the nation's second and fifth most populous urban regions respectively, with the former having more than 18.7million residents and the latter having over 9.6million. Sacramento is the state's capital, while Los Angeles is the most populous city in the state and the second most populous city in the country. San Francisco is the second most densely populated major city in the country. Los Angeles County is the country's most populous, while San Bernardino County is the largest county by area in the country. California borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, the Mex ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Telescope Peak
Telescope Peak is the highest point within Death Valley National Park, in the U.S. state of California. It is also the highest point of the Panamint Range, and lies in Inyo County. From atop this desert mountain one can see for over one hundred miles in many directions, including west to Mount Whitney, and east to Charleston Peak. The mountain was named for the great distance visible from the summit. Geography Telescope Peak is also notable for having one of the greatest vertical rises above local terrain of any mountain in the contiguous United States. Its summit rises above the lowest point in Death Valley, Badwater Basin at , in about , and about above the floor of Panamint Valley in about .''Southern California Atlas and Gazetteer'', DeLorme Mapping, 1990. This is comparable to the rises of other tall, but better known, U.S. peaks. It is even somewhat comparable to the rise of Mount Everest above its northern base on the Tibetan Plateau, a rise of roughly . However Ever ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
