Fault plane measurements
9,942 fault plane measurements from published US geologic maps, recorded as strike and dip and cited to the map each came from — 1% of the Atlas.
Show only fault plane on the map
What it is
A fault plane is the discrete surface a displacement happened on. The plane's strike and dip say how the fault is oriented; they do not say which way, or how far, the rock moved.
That distinction matters for anyone doing kinematic work. A fault plane on its own supports map-scale interpretation and little more. A fault plane paired with a slickenline measured on it is a fault-slip datum: plane, plus slip direction, plus — where the source recorded it — a sense of shear. That is the input to paleostress inversion and to fault-slip analysis generally.
The Atlas identifies those pairs where the published data supports it, nesting a lineation under the plane it was measured on rather than leaving the two as unrelated points on a map.
How the Atlas records it
Every fault plane row carries an azimuth and an inclination in one convention
(right-hand-rule strike and dip), a position in WGS 84 with the publisher's
own location confidence, the raw type term as the source published it, and the citation of the source map.
Selections export as CSV with a companion sources.csv of citations.
Which sources have it
| Source | Measurements | Share |
|---|---|---|
| Washington Geol. Survey | 2,801 | 28% |
| NPS GRI parks | 2,224 | 22% |
| NGMDB legacy quads | 1,736 | 17% |
| USGS NGMDB GeMS | 968 | 10% |
| USGS data releases · MRDS | 827 | 8% |
| Vermont Geol. Survey | 649 | 7% |
| USGS SIM quads (NE) | 372 | 4% |
| Alaska DGGS | 269 | 3% |
| South Dakota SDGS | 61 | <1% |
| Idaho Geol. Survey | 27 | <1% |
| Oregon DOGAMI (OGDC-8) | 5 | <1% |
| Pennsylvania Geol. Survey | 2 | <1% |
| Wyoming WSGS | 1 | <1% |
Where it is
| State | Measurements | Share |
|---|---|---|
| Washington | 2,958 | 30% |
| California | 2,152 | 22% |
| Arizona | 773 | 8% |
| Vermont | 750 | 8% |
| Texas | 483 | 5% |
| Alaska | 413 | 4% |
| Colorado | 375 | 4% |
| Montana | 284 | 3% |
| North Carolina | 221 | 2% |
| New Hampshire | 217 | 2% |
| Virginia | 206 | 2% |
| Maine | 180 | 2% |
| New Mexico | 180 | 2% |
| Idaho | 123 | 1% |
| Oregon | 119 | 1% |
| Pennsylvania | 79 | <1% |
| New York | 66 | <1% |
| South Dakota | 65 | <1% |
| South Carolina | 46 | <1% |
| Nevada | 45 | <1% |
| New Jersey | 37 | <1% |
| Utah | 22 | <1% |
| Minnesota | 12 | <1% |
| Wyoming | 9 | <1% |
| Kentucky | 8 | <1% |
| Georgia | 6 | <1% |
| Massachusetts | 4 | <1% |
| Arkansas | 1 | <1% |