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Sub-surface geometry of Ar Rika and Ruwah faults from gravity and magnetic surveys

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Abstract

Ten global positioning system (GPS)–gravity profiles were conducted to provide sub-surface geometry of two sections of the Najd Fault System (NFS) Ruwah and Ar Rika faults, six in the Afif and four in the Al Muwayh area about 500 and 650 km west of Riyadh, respectively. GPS surveys were collected in differential GPS (DGPS) mode, allowing a large area to be covered in limited time. DGPS is utilized for the advantages of accuracy, economy, and speed. Output DGPS location coordinates were used in free-air and Bouguer reductions; terrain corrections were applied using a 3-arcsecond digital elevation model; finally, isostatic and decompensative corrections were applied. Integration of the resulting decompensative isostatic residual anomalies and aeromagnetic map has mapped the NFS very accurately. Modeling the gravity field crossing the Ruwah fault zone revealed that it is associated with low gravity anomalies probably due to a complex of lower density crushed rocks and modeled the geometry of the subsurface structure of Ar Rika fault as an inclined fault with reverse movement that would imply a compression component (post-dated the shearing) parallel to the plane of the cross-section.

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Acknowledgment

We are very grateful for the huge facilities offered to us by the Department of Geology and Geophysics, King Saud University. It is impossible to express all the knowledge and insights gained from ongoing conversations with our colleagues at the department. We also would like to thank deeply Professor Dafer Al-Garni and Dr. Abdullah Al-Salman in the Civil Engineering Department, KSU, for their invaluable assistance in the geodetic GPS surveying. Also, we would like to thank the Military Survey Department of Saudi Arabia for providing part of the digital topographic data used in this paper.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Geology Department, College of Sciences, King Saud University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia

    S. Mogren & A. M. Al-Amri

  2. King Abdulaziz City for Science and Technology, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia

    K. Al-Damegh & A. Algamdi

  3. Earth Sciences Department, University of Leeds, Leeds, England

    D. Fairhead

  4. GETECH, Leeds, England

    S. Jassim

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  1. S. Mogren
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  2. A. M. Al-Amri
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  3. K. Al-Damegh
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  4. D. Fairhead
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  5. S. Jassim
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  6. A. Algamdi
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Correspondence to S. Mogren.

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Mogren, S., Al-Amri, A.M., Al-Damegh, K. et al. Sub-surface geometry of Ar Rika and Ruwah faults from gravity and magnetic surveys. Arab J Geosci 1, 33–47 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12517-008-0003-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12517-008-0003-3

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