If you'll go back to one of my earlier aerial views of the Fisher Towers and Professor Valley areas on the Colorado River, you'll see that I've enlarged one corner - and added in a couple lines indicating two faults that cut through the area. The faults, also seen on the geologic maps of the area, here and here, appear to be closely related to the northwest-trending Arches National Park uplift or anticline.
The photo above shows the dropped down and possibly folded or slumped graben, as seen from the dirt road just below Fisher Towers. The camera was looking just a little bit south of west (WSW).
And here's a little field sketch of the same faulted area, as drawn in 1997 from a slightly different angle, showing how all units in the center of the two faults have been dropped down. The cliff-forming, Jurassic Wingate Sandstone is a good marker bed to follow in the photos and in the cartoon-like field sketch.If you drive Utah Route 128 from I-70 to Moab, you will pass right by these structures. And actually, because they cross the river and the road, you will drive right over them.
This post, and others, were submitted to the first Carnival of the Arid at Coyote Crossing.
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