Week Seven – Death Valley

            Titus Canyon Mosaic in Death Valley National Park, CA (U.S Geological Survey, n.d.a).

Today I came across the photos my family took while driving through Death Valley last year.  As we went through the photos I was wondering about some information about the rocks in the photos.  The first stop was at Titus Canyon and the photo was of breccia.  Wondering how the formation developed, I wanted to know what type of angular rocks they were, age of the rocks, what type of sand or clay material they were held together by, and some knowledge of the surrounding area.  I think this information could help put together a picture of where the rocks came from and how the rocks arrived in their current location.  Since the rocks are not smooth and are angular, they probably did not travel that far and depending upon the type of sand or clay that is holding them together hopefully we could determine the probable force that moved the rocks, an example would be glaciers, and what deposited the sand or clay to cement them into place.  Then I could this information with a geologic map to determine where the rocks and cementing material likely came from.

         Amargosa Chaso in Death Valley National Park, CA (U.S Geological Survey, n.d.b).

The next photo I came across was the photo of Amargosa Chaos.  From viewing this photo, I started to wonder the exact color and types of the rocks in the photos.  Using the age and the color could map out an idea of what the landscape looked like before the faults and folds began impacting the makeup of the rock formation.  I also wanting to see a topographical map of the area in hopes to determine where the diverging fault is exactly in this area, I think the map would assist in seeing this clearly. 

           Split Cinder Cone in Death Valley National Park, CA (U.S Geological Survey, n.d.c).

The last photo that really peaked my interest was the overhead photo of the split cinder cone.  When I see a section of the cinder cone separated away from the remaining portion of the cinder cone my first thought is that I would like to know the date and type of rock that has formed from the previous volcanic activity.  This would give an idea of the dates this activity happened and what viscosity and temperature the lava was that created this cinder cone.  I would also like to know the age of the rocks in the gap between the sections of cinder cones so that we could determine if the fault is a divergent fault or the separation is the result of the fault slipping.  The last piece of data that interest me would be the distance the two sections have traveled in along the fault from each other since the cinder cone was developed.  I think this data would give a good basis of the type of fault and the speed or frequency the fault will travel on an average basis.

                                                                       References

U.S Geological Survey. (n.d.a). Death Valley National Park Geology Image Gallery – Titus Canyon. Retrieved from https://geomaps.wr.usgs.gov/parks/deva/galtit.html

U.S Geological Survey. (n.d.b). Death Valley National Park Geology Image Gallery – Amargosa Chaos. Retrieved from https://geomaps.wr.usgs.gov/parks/deva/galchaos.html

U.S Geological Survey. (n.d.c). Death Valley National Park Geology Image Gallery – Split Cinder. Retrieved from https://geomaps.wr.usgs.gov/parks/deva/galcin.html