Lake Mead - a hogback ridge

This hogback ridge is along the Northshore Road near milepost 14. Steeply dipping strata in the cliff face consists of the Bitter Ridge Limestone Member of the Horse Spring Formation. The limestone accumulated is a shallow lake that formed in the early stages of Great Basin extension (crustal stretching) that produced the mountain ranges and sediment-filled basins in the region. The red outcrops in the foreground are called the Red Sandstone and are part of sedimentary basin fill deposits of Late Miocene Age (Tingley and others, 2001; Beard and others, 2007).