Ebbor Gorge - 2018-02-19
A very foggy day.
The Mendip Hills are interpreted as a foreland fold and thrust belt with northward transport and shortening of some 20 km (40%). The well developed periclinal folds trend E-W and are asymmetric with steeply dipping to overturned northern limbs, which is typically where the thrust faulting is located.
In the southern Mendips this brittle deformation is represented by the ~ E-W trending Cheddar- Wells thrust belt, which is best exposed in the area just west of Ebbor gorge where the Ebbor thrust and fault come to the surface. This area is unusual in the Mendips in that rocks of the Upper Carboniferous are exposed, including a thin unit of Coal Measures (CM). The Ebbor thrust cuts through a tight fold in the Clifton Down Lst which is thrust over the younger CM rocks forming a narrow water logged strip .
Illustrated report available to members on request.
Further information
- SWT: Deer Leap - Heritage Reserve and description, with picture of the view [SWT]
- BGS: Lower Carboniferous rocks - description of Black Rock and Hotwells Limestones [BGS]
- BGS: Draycott and Westbury-sub-Mendip - Upper Carboniferous Quartzitic Sandstone and the Coal Measures [BGS]
- GS: Somerset Coal Measures - description [Geological Society's Lyell Collection]