Application of Terrestrial Laser Scanning in determining the pattern of late Pleistocene and Holocene fault-displacement from the offset of pluvial lake shorelines in the Alvord extensional basin, northern Great Basin, USA

The northerly-trending Alvord extensional basin of southeastern Oregon lies along the northern margin of the Great Basin. The basin is nearly 200 km long and 15 km wide and is bound and internally dissected by a complex system of active normal faults. 

The faults cut Pleistocene wave-cut terraces that formed along successive shorelines of pluvial Lake Alvord. The wave-cut terraces are incised into late Tertiary volcanic and sedimentary rocks and unconsolidated Quaternary sediments. The terraces formed during stillstands of the ancient lake, during at least two cycles of lake-fill and desiccation in the Pleistocene. Wave-cut terraces are divided into two sets, with the topographically higher and older. Serrano terrace series consisting of three shorelines and the Alvord terrace series composed of the five topographically lower and younger shorelines. Shorelines are dated locally and together with regional correlation to other pluvial lakes, the Serrano highstand is estimated at 200-130 ka and the Alvord highstand at 20-15 ka. 

High-resolution topographic images of the terrace morphology acquired by Terrestrial Laser Scanning georeferenced with the Global Positioning System allowed detailed analysis of shoreline altitudes where they are cross-cut by faults.  Variation in shoreline altitude measured across faults and on opposing sides of the basin indicate that fault slip occurred during and following periods of lake-level recession. The Serrano terrace highstand records a cumulative vertical displacement of 137.5 ± 3.6 m and the vertical offset of the younger, Alvord terrace series highstand is 72.5 ± 2.8 m. 

Fault displacement is heterogeneously distributed across the basin. Faults along the western margin of the basin accommodated nearly 50% of the total displacement with one fault accommodating nearly 30% of the total displacement budget. The residual displacement is distributed across the basin. As much as 30% of the cumulative offset is taken up by structures concealed beneath basin cover and 20% by structures exposed in the highlands along the eastern flank of the basin. 

Since formation of the Alvord shorelines, the rate of fault displacement was non-periodic and the basin experienced elevated activity in the late Pleistocene and early Holocene. Vertical displacement rates vary through time and offset of Alvord terraces occurred at 3.6 to 7.3 mm/yr whereas displacement of the Serrano terraces ranged from 0.7 to 1.1 mm/yr. When the horizontal component of motion is calculated by using fault dips of 60°, the 10⁴ year time-scale rate determined from the Alvord terraces is as much as 2.4 to 4.2 mm/yr and exceeds the contemporary horizontal displacement across the basin of 1.75 mm/yr determined geodetically. The10⁵ year horizontal displacement rate calculated for the Serrano highstand is substantially lower at 0.4 to 0.6 mm/yr. 

Spatial and temporal pattern of faulting within the Alvord basin illustrates the complexity of strain release within the basin and highlights the length- and time-scale dependence of deformation rate estimation within extensional basins.