Structural evolution and paleoseismicity of the Kyaukkyan Fault, Myanmar

Silvia Crosetto & Ian Watkinson

Aims
Myanmar has been affected by the ongoing convergence of India and Eurasia since the Paleogene. Presently India’s northward movement results in strike-slip motion along a diffuse N-S-trending plate boundary, which includes the active Kyaukkyan Fault, source of a 1912 M8.0 earthquake. This understudied and tectonically significant fault poses a considerable seismic hazard to the growing population living in the area. This project aims to reconstruct the Holocene palaeoseismic history of the Kyaukkyan Fault and its role in oblique convergence across the India-Sundaland margin.

Background
Northward movement of the coupled India-West Burma Block relative to Sundaland led to the development of two main strike-slip systems in Eastern Myanmar: a N-S-trending fault system, including the active Sagaing Fault, the Shan Scarp Fault System and the Kyaukkyan Fault, and an E-W-trending fault system, including the Momeik and Kyaukme Faults. The Shan Scarp Fault System cross-cuts the Mogok Gneiss of the Mogok Metamorphic Belt. On the Shan Plateau, the N-S-trending Kyaukkyan Fault affects a Palaeozoic sedimentary succession and the Permo-Triassic Plateau Limestone carbonate system.

Recent Papers –

Max Webb et al., 2020. Isotopic mapping reveals the location of crustal fragments along a long-lived convergent plate boundary. Lithos.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.lithos.2020.105687

Max Webb et al., 2020. The history of Cenozoic magmatism and collision in NW New Guinea – New insights into the tectonic evolution of the northernmost margin of the Australian Plate. Gondwana Research.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gr.2019.12.010

Amy Gough et al., 2020. Mid-Cenozoic fluvio-deltaic to marine environments of the Salin Sub-basin, Central Myanmar. Journal of Asian Earth Sciences.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jseaes.2019.104143

Recent News –

Amy Gough and Max Webb attended the Restech 2.0 Virtual Reservoir Conference. Amy Gough presented new SEARG research on the pitfalls of light mineral studies for sedimentary provenance in tropical climates.

Amy Gough was awarded an honorary research fellowship of the British Geological Survey and continues to foster collaborative relationships between SEARG and the BGS.