Tectonics of the Longmen Shan and Adjacent Regions, Central China

Abstract

The Longmen Shan region includes, from west to east, the northeastern part of the Tibetan Plateau, the Sichuan Basin, and the eastern part of the eastern Sichuan fold-and-thrust belt. In the northeast, it merges with the Micang Shan, a part of the Qinling Mountains. The Longmen Shan region can be divided into two major tectonic elements: (1) an autochthon/parautochthon, which underlies the easternmost part of the Tibetan Plateau, the Sichuan Basin, and the eastern Sichuan fold-and-thrust belt; and (2) a complex allochthon, which underlies the eastern part of the Tibetan Plateau. The allochthon was emplaced toward the southeast during Late Triassic time, and it and the western part of the autochthon/parautochthon were modified by Cenozoic deformation. The autochthon/parautochthon was formed from the western part of the Yangtze platform and consists of a Proterozoic basement covered by a thin, incomplete succession of Late Proterozoic to Middle Triassic shallow-marine and nonmarine sedimentary rocks interrupted by Permian extension and basic magmatism in the southwest. The platform is bounded by continental margins that formed in Silurian time to the west and in Late Proterozoic time to the north. Within the southwestern part of the platform is the narrow N-trending Kungdian high, a paleogeographic unit that was positive during part of Paleozoic time and whose crest is characterized by nonmarine Upper Triassic rocks unconformably overlying Proterozoic basement. In the western part of the Longmen Shan region, the allochthon is composed mainly of a very thick succession of strongly folded Middle and Upper Triassic Songpan Ganzi flysch. Along the eastern side and at the base of the allochthon, pre-Upper Triassic rocks crop out, forming the only exposures of the western margin of the Yangtze platform. Here, Upper Proterozoic to Ordovician, mainly shallow-marine rocks unconformably overlie Yangtze-type Proterozic basement rocks, but in Silurian time a thick section of fine-grained clastic and carbonate rocks were deposited, marking the initial subsidence of the western Yangtze platform and formation of a continental margin. Similar deep-water rocks were deposited throughout Devonian to Middle Triassic time, when Songpan Ganzi flysch deposition began. Permian conglomerate and basic volcanic rocks in the southeastern part of the allochthon indicate a second period of extension along the continental margin. Evidence suggests that the deep-water region along and west of the Yangtze continental margin was underlain mostly by thin continental crust, but its westernmost part may have contained areas underlain by oceanic crust. In the northern part of the Longmen Shan allochthon, thick Devonian to Upper Triassic shallow-water deposits of the Xue Shan platform are flanked by deep-marine rocks and the platform is interpreted to be a fragment of the Qinling continental margin transported westward during early Mesozoic transpressive tectonism. In the Longmen Shan region, the allochthon, carrying the western part of the Yangtze continental margin and Songpan Ganzi flysch, was emplaced to the southeast above rocks of the Yangtze platform autochthon. The eastern margin of the allochthon in the northern Longmen Shan is unconformably overlapped by both Lower and Middle Jurassic strata that are continuous with rocks of the autochthon. Folded rocks of the allochthon are unconformably overlapped by Lower and Middle Jurassic rocks in rare outcrops in the northern part of the region. They also are extensively intruded by a poorly dated, generally undeformed belt, of plutons whose ages (mostly K/Ar ages) range from Late Triassic to early Cenozoic, but most of the reliable ages are early Mesozoic. All evidence indicates that the major deformation within the allochthon is Late Triassic/Early Jurassic in age (Indosinian). The eastern front of the allochthon trends southwest across the present mountain front, so it lies along the mountain front in the northeast, but is located well to the west of the present mountain front on the south. The Late Triassic deformation is characterized by upright to overturned folded and refolded Triassic flysch, with generally NW-trending axial traces in the western part of the region. Folds and thrust faults curve to the north when traced to the east, so that along the eastern front of the allochthon structures trend northeast, involve pre-Triassic rocks, and parallel the eastern boundary of the allochthon. The curvature of structural trends is interpreted as forming part of a left-lateral transpressive boundary developed during emplacement of the allochthon. Regionally, the Longmen Shan lies along a NE-trending transpressive margin of the Yangtze platform within a broad zone of generally N-S shortening. North of the Longmen Shan region, northward subduction led to collision of the South and North China continental fragments along the Qinling Mountains, but northwest of the Longmen Shan region, subduction le