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Scientific Investigations Report 2006-5279

The Lakhra Anticline—An Active Structure of Pleistocene to Holocene Age in Southern Pakistan

By William F. Outerbridge and John R. SanFilipo (U.S. Geological Survey), Rafiq Ahmed Khan (Geological Survey of Pakistan)

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The Lakhra anticline is a breached north-trending structure northwest of Hyderabad in Sindh Province, Pakistan. About 340 meters (m) of Paleocene to Holocene strata have been eroded from the core of the anticline. North-trending normal faults transect the anticline at a low angle, are vertical, and form a set of nested grabens.

Lakhra Nala and Siph Nala were formed where antecedent streams eroded the nalas (canyons, gullies, ravines, or watercourses and the streams in them) as the anticline rose. Lakhra Nala flows onto the Indus River flood plain, which is accumulating about 6.1 m of alluvium per 1,000 years. If the anticline rose at an equivalent rate, it started to rise about 60,000 years ago.

In 1985, the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), under an agreement with the U.S. Agency for International Development and in cooperation with the Geological Survey of Pakistan, began a coal exploration project in southern Pakistan. This report uses data from the project to interpret the age of the anticline. This report updates (but does not supersede) USGS Open-File Report 89-427 by W.F. Outerbridge and Rafiq Ahmed Khan, adding more evidence of continuing tectonic activity, topographic data, and stream data.

Suggested citation:

Outerbridge, W.F., SanFilipo, J.R., and Khan, R.A., 2007, The Lakhra anticline--An active structure of Pleistocene to Holocene age in southern Pakistan: U.S. Geological Survey Scientific Investigations Report 2006–5279, 16 p., available only online. (Updates but does not supersede USGS Open-File Report 89-427.)

For more information please contact the author.


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