20 June 2010

Harpers Foldry

Posted by Callan Bentley

Cleaning out the backlog of photos I haven’t popped up here yet… Here’s three shots from last weekend, of folds (some kinky) which deform Harpers Formation foliation, just south of Harpers Ferry, West Virginia:

hf_3

hf_2

hf_1

The Harpers is a Cambrian-aged lagoonal mudrock, dated via Olenellus trilobites in Pennsylvania. It is part of a transgressive sequence that followed Iapetan rifting of the mid-Atlantic, and was later deformed during Alleghanian mountain-building. That’s when the pronounced foliation was imparted, and when that foliation was folded (also overturned). There are plenty of nice exposures of kink folds in this charismatic rock throughout historic Harpers Ferry. Check it out if you’re ever there on a history field trip.