El Arrayán Fault ( es, Falla El Arrayán) is a
geological fault, located inmediataly north of the city of
Santiago
Santiago (, ; ), also known as Santiago de Chile, is the capital and largest city of Chile as well as one of the largest cities in the Americas. It is the center of Chile's most densely populated region, the Santiago Metropolitan Region, whos ...
in Chile. The fault runs in northwest-southeast direction. Likely, the fault was last active sometime in the
Quaternary period
Period may refer to:
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* Era, a length or span of time
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Arts, entertainment, and media
* Period (music), a concept in musical composition
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(last 2.5 million years).
It is chiefly a
strike-slip fault.
Fault scarp
A fault scarp is a small step or offset on the ground surface where one side of a fault has moved vertically with respect to the other. It is the topographic expression of faulting attributed to the displacement of the land surface by movement a ...
s,
sag ponds,
mountain saddle
In geomorphology, a col is the lowest point on a mountain ridge between two peaks.Whittow, John (1984). ''Dictionary of Physical Geography''. London: Penguin, 1984, p. 103. . It may also be called a gap. Particularly rugged and forbidding c ...
s and stream deflection are some of the surface features of El Arrayán Fault.
[ The fault is estimated to be able to produce 6.4 Mw-strong earthquakes which make it a significant risk factor for the northernmost neighbourhoods of Santiago.][
]
References
Geology of Santiago Metropolitan Region
Seismic faults of Chile
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