Cheol Woo Song

Geometry and kinematics of the Ocheon Fault System along the boundary between the Miocene Pohang and Janggi basins, SE Korea, and its tectonic implications

Detailed geological mapping and observations of various structural elements were made in order to determine the geometry and kinematics of the Ocheon Fault System (OFS) along the boundary between the Early Miocene Janggi and the Middle Miocene Pohang basins, SE Korea, and to reveal its roles on the basin evolutions. The OFS is a NE-trending relayed fault system composed of a number of NE or NNE-trending normal-slip and sinistral-normal oblique-slip faults, and has a scissor fault geometry decreasing in vertical offset southwestward. The constituent faults created independent grabens or half-grabens on the hanging-walls for the deposition of the Early or Middle Miocene strata. The OFS was initially the northwestern border fault of the Janggi Basin which acted as normal faults by the WNW-ESE tensional stress associated with the NNW-directed dextral simple shear caused by the East Sea opening. Afterwards, it experienced clockwise rotation with change of slip sense from normal-slip to sinistral-normal oblique-slip in response to the progressive dextral simple shear. At about 17 Ma, the shear stress propagating westward was released rapidly by the dextral strike-slip faulting of the NNW-trending Yeonil Tectonic Line (YTL) and the normal faulting of the NNE-trending western border faults of the Pohang Basin. At that time, the depocenter suddenly migrated northward and the depositional environment also changed rapidly from terrestrial to marine due to dramatic subsidence of the Pohang Basin. The Pohang Basin is interpreted to be a pull-apart basin extended at releasing bend/overstep between two PDZs (Principal Displacement Zones), i.e., the YTL and probably the East Korea Fault. The OFS was also reactivated as the eastern border faults of the Pohang Basin. In contrast to the western border faults, the OFS was rotated clockwise and could not be linked with the YTL because of its scissor fault geometry. Our results suggest that the NNW-trending regional dextral shear stress persisted for a considerable period of time in SE Korea during the East Sea opening, supporting the pull-apart opening of the East Sea rather than the fan-shaped opening. Most of the previous studies advocating the pull-apart opening emphasize the role of the NNE-trending strikeslip faults, like the Yangsan fault and OFS, as PDZs. In contrast, this study suggests that the NNE-trending faults in SE Korea acted as major normal faults at releasing bends or stepovers in the NNW-trending dextral fault system during the East Sea opening.

Miocene tectonic evolution of the basins and fault systems, SE Korea: Dextral, simple shear during the East Sea (Sea of Japan) opening

Crustal deformation of SE Korea caused by back-arc opening of the East Sea (Sea of Japan) commenced locally in the Late Oligocene. Intense deformation occurred during the Early Miocene, accompanying extension of parallelogram-shaped pull-apart basins between NNW-striking principal displacement zones, clockwise rotation and northwestward tilting of blocks, and southwestward propagating rifting. At about 17 Ma, the crustal deformation suddenly expanded westward and northward owing to activation of the Yeonil Tectonic Line, resulting in a dramatic change of depositional environment and the subsidence of wedge-shaped pull-apart basins. The Yeonil Tectonic Line and western border faults of the Pohang Basin are the westernmost limit of the Miocene crustal deformation. All the features of crustal deformation in SE Korea support the pull-apart model for the East Sea opening. However, they indicate that the NNW-striking faults such as the Yeonil Tectonic Line acted as the principal displacement zones rather than the NNE-striking Yangsan Fault under a consistent dextral simple shear. At about 16 Ma, the collision of the Philippine Sea Plate with the Japanese Islands caused a tectonic inversion. This inversion resulted in a compositional change of basaltic magma at about 15 Ma and crustal uplift in SE Korea, which caused the cessation of sedimentation at about 10 Ma.

Development of the intracontinental, continuous, narrow transpressional zone along the Sinnyeong Fault in the Cretaceous Gyeongsang Basin, SE Korea

The WNW-ESE-striking Sinnyeong Fault, the most conspicuous fault of the Gaeum Fault System in the Cretaceous Gyeongsang Basin of Korea, provides an opportunity to understand the architectures and evolution of an intracontinental transpressional fault zone. We focus on the structural characteristics of the Sinnyeong Fault based on detailed field observations and magnetic fabric analysis. Its main movement is interpreted as sinistral slip with a small reverse component, although it could also have been active before the main movement. The deformation zone is asymmetric about the fault core. Sedimentary strata of the southern deformation zone are more extensively folded and deformed than those of the northern part, and the southern zone is much wider than the northern zone. NW-SE-trending en-echelon folds are limited to the southern periphery of the fault zone, where it is narrow, and underwent rotation toward the fault surface. These contractional deformations along the entire length of the fault are interpreted to have formed approximately coevally with the sinistral faulting. Newly observed WNW-ESE-striking mappable faults show a similar structural feature. Our results suggest that the damage asymmetry resulted from the eastward transport direction and relative uplift of south blocks of the faults under NE-SW compressive stress, which oriented at high angle (60–70°) to pre-existing strike of the faults. During progressive deformation, continuing slip accumulation along vertically tilted and fault-parallel sedimentary strata located directly south of the fault cores was responsible for the larger motions of the southern blocks of the faults rather than the relatively fixed northern blocks. We highlight that the sinistral reactivation of the Sinnyeong Fault formed a continuous, narrow transpressional zone during its long-term evolution.