The Darling Fault is one of the longest and most significant faults in Australia, extending for at least 1500 km in a north–south orientation near the west coast of southern

Western Australia Western Australia (commonly abbreviated as WA) is a state of Australia occupying the western percent of the land area of Australia excluding external territories. It is bounded by the Indian Ocean to the north and west, the Southern Ocean to th ...

. It is a major geological boundary separating the Archaean

Yilgarn Craton The Yilgarn Craton is a large craton that constitutes the bulk of the Western Australian land mass. It is bounded by a mixture of sedimentary basins and Proterozoic fold and thrust belts. Zircon grains in the Jack Hills, Narryer Terrane have b ...

in the east from the younger Pinjarra Orogen and overlying Phanerozoic

Perth Basin The Perth Basin is a thick, elongated sedimentary basin in Western Australia. It lies beneath the Swan Coastal Plain west of the Darling Scarp, representing the western limit of the much older Yilgarn Craton, and extends further west offshore. C ...

to the west. The fault zone is very ancient and initially formed during the Proterozoic Eon. In the

Perth Perth is the capital and largest city of the Australian state of Western Australia. It is the fourth most populous city in Australia and Oceania, with a population of 2.1 million (80% of the state) living in Greater Perth in 2020. Perth i ...

area, the Darling Fault must once have coincided with the

Darling Scarp The Darling Scarp, also referred to as the Darling Range or Darling Ranges, is a low escarpment running north–south to the east of the Swan Coastal Plain and Perth, Western Australia. The escarpment extends generally north of Bindoon, to t ...

, the abrupt escarpment immediately east of the city of Perth, but the scarp has since eroded eastward of the fault, leaving a formation of foothills known as the

Ridge Hill Shelf The Ridge Hill Shelf is a landform that forms part of the foothills of the Darling Scarp, a low escarpment that runs parallel with the west coast in southwest Western Australia. It was formed by coastal erosion of the scarp in the Pleistocene, whe ...

. The fault is located on the western edge of the Ridge Hill Shelf; a good reference point of its location is the point where the

Great Eastern Highway Great Eastern Highway is a road that links the Western Australian capital of Perth with the city of Kalgoorlie. A key route for road vehicles accessing the eastern Wheatbelt and the Goldfields, it is the western portion of the main road link ...

passes over the current Eastern railway line in

Bellevue Bellevue means "beautiful view" in French. It may refer to: Placenames Australia * Bellevue, Western Australia * Bellevue Hill, New South Wales * Bellevue, Queensland * Bellevue, Glebe, an historic house in Sydney, New South Wales Canada ...

. When Greater Perth is looked from an aerial perspective, a faint line can be seen running down the edge of the hills.

Notes

References

* Myers, J. S. (1992) Pinjarra Orogen, in Geology and Mineral Resources of Western Australia: Western Australia Geological Survey, Memoir 3, 77–119. * Geology of Western Australia Darling Range Seismic faults of Australia {{Australia-geology-stub