The Rio Grande begins as an east-flowing stream in the San Juan Mountains in Colorado. The river turns near Alamosa, Colorado, and flows southward through a series of en echelon (slightly overlapping, east or west stepping), elongated basins that bisect southern Colorado and the state of New Mexico.
Where does the Rio Grande Rift start and end?
The Rio Grande rift is a north-trending continental rift zone. It separates the Colorado Plateau in the west from the interior of the North American craton on the east. The rift extends from central Colorado in the north to the state of Chihuahua, Mexico, in the south.
Where is the Rio Grande Rift located?
Brief Description. The Rio Grande rift is a north-south trending zone of approximately east-west oriented extension that bisects the state of New Mexico. The extension is due to the Colorado Plateau pulling away from the High Plains, which causes the Earth’s crust to be stretched and thinned.
What plate is the Rio Grande Rift on?
North American continental plate
The southwestern region of the United States is geologically fascinating. The Colorado Plateau, with a smorgasbord of awe-inspiring rock formations and geological features, rises dramatically from the Rio Grande rift. The rift is a large, sunken region in the middle of the North American continental plate.
Is the Rio Grande Rift still active?
The Rio Grande Rift, a thinning and stretching of Earth’s surface that extends from Colorado’s central Rocky Mountains to Mexico, is not dead but geologically alive and active, according to a new study involving scientists from the University of Colorado Boulder’s Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental
Where are the fault lines in New Mexico?
Quaternary faults are found throughout the western two-thirds of the state, but they are especially concentrated in the Rio Grande rift, a narrow belt of basins that bisect New Mexico and Colorado. Santa Clara fault near Española.
When did the Rio Grande Rift begin?
about 36 million years ago
The river’s course through southern Colorado and New Mexico is controlled by a geologic feature known as the Rio Grande rift, which formed when Earth’s crust stretched and thinned in an east-west direction starting about 36 million years ago (36 Ma).
How long is the Rio Grande Rift?
The Rio Grande Rift consists of a series of north-south asymmetrical basins that are oppositely hinged. These basins extend from Leadville Colorado to Chihuahua Mexico, a distance of more than 1000 km.
Is Rio on a fault line?
(Image credit: NASA.) The U.S. Southwest isn’t particularly known for its seismic activity, but the Rio Grande Rift, a series of faults and basins that runs from central Colorado south through New Mexico, is alive and stretching, new research shows.
Where is San Andreas Fault located?
San Andreas Fault, major fracture of the Earth’s crust in extreme western North America. The fault trends northwestward for more than 800 miles (1,300 km) from the northern end of the Gulf of California through western California, U.S., passing seaward into the Pacific Ocean in the vicinity of San Francisco.
Which location is on a major rift valley?
The East African Rift, the Baikal Rift Valley, the West Antarctic Rift, and the Rio Grande Rift are Earth’s major active continental rift valleys.
Where do rift zones form?
Rift zones are fundamental Earth structures that reveal the nature of forces acting on the surface of the Earth. They form in three basic tectonic settings: (1) mid-ocean ridges, (2) continents, and (3) mid-plate oceanic islands.
What river divides Mexico from the US?
The Rio Grande
The Rio Grande is the fifth longest river in the United States and among the top twenty in the world. It extends from the San Juan Mountains of Colorado to the Gulf of Mexico (1,901 miles) and forms a 1,255 mile segment of the border between the United States and Mexico.
Is there a tectonic plate in New Mexico?
New Mexico lies within a single plate, the North American plate, but our state has been affected by the movement of plates far away, along the western edge of the continent.
Can earthquakes occur in the Rio Grande Rift?
Although it is less likely to have large-scale seismic activity than regions such as the San Andreas Fault in California, a large earthquake (7.0 magnitude or larger) will occur in the Rio Grande Rift area at some point in the future.
How deep is the Rio Grande Gorge in Taos New Mexico?
800 feet
The gorge depth is 800 feet (240 m) just south of the Rio Grande Gorge Bridge, which spans the gorge 10 miles (16 km) northwest of Taos.
Does El Paso sit on a fault line?
It turns out that there are many active fault lines in the El Paso area, especially on the east side of the Franklin mountains. Yes, El Paso sits near an earthquake fault line that runs along the east side of the Franklin Mountains crossing over Transmountain along Alabama Street near NE El Paso.
Is New Mexico earthquake prone?
Small earthquakes occur somewhere in New Mexico everyday, but no earthquake larger than magnitude (M) 6.2 has occurred within the New Mexico part of the rift since 1849, and prob- ably no damaging event occurred in the previous few hundred years, based on oral history.
Has there ever been an earthquake in Santa Fe NM?
The United States Geological Survey reported a magnitude 4.3 quake in the United States near Santa Fe, Santa Fe County, New Mexico, only 21 minutes ago.
How deep and wide is the East African Rift Valley?
The Rift Valley of eastern Africa and Asia (sometimes called the Great Rift Valley [GRV] or East African Rift system [EAR or EARS]) is an enormous geological split in the crust of the earth, thousands of kilometers long, up to 125 miles (200 kilometers) wide, and between a few hundred to thousands of meters deep.
What plate boundary is the San Andreas Fault on?
The San Andreas Fault is a continental transform fault that extends roughly 1,200 kilometers (750 mi) through California. It forms the tectonic boundary between the Pacific Plate and the North American Plate, and its motion is right-lateral strike-slip (horizontal).
