Late cenozoic identation/escape tectonics in the eastern Betic Cordilleras and its consequences on the Iberian foreland

Abstract

The structuration of the southeastern quarter of the Iberian Peninsula (eastern Betics and Iberian foreland), since Messinian time, was the result of a series of complex deformational events, as related to a major NNE-SSW sinistral shear zone disrupting the southeasternmost part of the Betic cordilleras (Trans-Alborán-Palomares shear zone; TAPSZ). Deformation along this shear zone was characterized by two differentiated and sequential scenarios: 1) periods of stress-build-up associated to momentary slip-obstruction along the TAPSZ, involving NW-directed indentation of the southeastern Iberian domain, and 2) periods of stress-release resulting from the lateral escape of wedge-shaped blocks, thus allowing full-scale strike-slip displacements along the TAPSZ. These events imposed compressional stress fields on the Iberian foreland, with a series of consequences such as alkaline volcanism in Calatrava and Cofrentes, protorift zones, changes in previous structural trends, localized uplift/doming processes, and changes in the sedimentary records of sorne basins.