Keywords
San Carlos Basin
Seismic Lines
Structural Styles
Nicaraguan Tectonic Depression
Graben de Nicaragua
Cuenca de San Carlos
Líneas sísmicas
Estilos estructurales
Depresión tectónica de Nicaragua
How to Cite
Abstract
Nicaragua’s tectonic depression extends from El Salvador to the plains in northern Costa Rica and is limited by strike-slip faults with a normal component. Based on a set of unpublished seismic lines, geology of the area, drilling data and surface seismicity, an analysis and interpretation of tectonic events in the SE sector of the Nicaraguan tectonic depression was carried out, in its extension towards Costa Rica in the San Carlos basin. The analysis of the seismic lines allowed a structural cross section and a schematic-evolutionary model. According to the chronology of deformation events, the San Carlos basin shows complex structural styles related to the different tectonic events affecting the region. The first structural style is associated with the development of an elongated graben implanted in the basement and limited by normal faults. This graben would have been inverted during the Middle-Upper Miocene, thus generating the second structural style, characterized by a series of inverse faults, folds and syn-orogenic basins. Finally, the third structural style associated with a transtensive event (Nicaragua graben), would be focused on the SW edge of the San Carlos basin and towards the N, in the lakes of Nicaragua during the Pliocene to present.
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