Abstract
There are two distinct tectonic events, early contractional and late dextral transpressional, within the larger designation of the Grenvillian Orogen in the Hudson Highlands of southern New York. The rocks of the Hudson Highlands are ca. 1.3 Ga, and are interpreted to have formed in an island arc or magmatic arc as volcanics, volcaniclastics, and sedimentary rocks. A continental collision terminated this segment of the geologic history and resulted in a major mountain belt. Deformation during this event is characterized by tight recumbent folds that resulted from westward-directed fold nappe emplacement. The predominant gneissic foliation was developed during granulite facies metamorphism, migmatization, and extensive pegmatite intrusion. Subsequent to this event, there was an episode of intrusion of dioritic, and locally anorthositic dikes and stocks. These bodies provide a time marker between the two orogenic events. The second event produced discrete zones of ductile deformation with a consistent dextral strike-slip shear sense and crenulation cleavage. This event is interpreted to result from tectonic escape resulting from a collision to the north of the study area. Steeply southeast to northwest dipping 1-3 km wide zones of mylonite display extensive shallow (15-20°) northeast trending lineations, S-C fabrics, asymmetric boudins, asymmetric intrafolial folding, and rotated porphyroclasts locally. These zones appear to have been active during a period of rapid cooling. Late in their history, the shear zones crossed the brittle-ductile transition and became dilational. Fracture systems formed along the zones and were progressively mineralized with hedenbergite, scapolite, magnetite, and quartz, phlogopite, hornblende, hematite, and calcite locally. Upright, gentle to open, and generally symmetric, north-trending mesoscopic to megascopic folds formed adjacent to the shear zones. The entire area was intruded by extensive pegmatite dikes and locally by granitic plutons. Pegmatites are common within the mineralized shear zones where they contain xenoliths of fault rock.
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Gates, A.E. (1999). Early Compression and Late Dextral Transpression Within the Grenvillian Event of the Hudson Highlands, NY, USA. In: Sinha, A.K. (eds) Basement Tectonics 13. Proceedings of the International Conferences on Basement Tectonics, vol 7. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-011-4800-9_6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-011-4800-9_6
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