Stratigraphy and structure of the Miners Mountain area, Wayne County, Utah

The Miners Mountain area includes about 85 square miles in Wayne County, south-central Utah. The area is semiarid and characterized by cliffs and deep canyons.

Formations range in age from Permian to Upper Jurassic and have an aggregate thickness of about 3,500 feet. Permian formations are the buff Coconino sandstone and the overlying white, limy, shert-containing Kaibab limestone. Unconformably overlying the Kaihab is the lower Triassic Moenkopi formation of reddish-brown and yellow mudstone, siltstone, and sandstone; it contains the Sinbad limestone member (?) in the lower part. Thin, lenticular Shinarump conglomerate unconformably overlies the Moenkopi, but grades upward into the Upper Triassic Chinle formation of variegated mudstone with some interbedded sandstone and limestone lenses. Uncomformably overlying the Chinle are the Wingate sandstone, Kayenta formation, and Navajo sandstone of the Jurassic (?) Glen Canyon group, which consist of red to white sandstone. Only the lower part of the Carmel formation of the Upper Jurassic San Rafael group is exposed in the area; it consists of variegated siltstone, sandstone, limestone, and gypsum.

The conspicuous structural feature in the area is the Teasdale anticline which trends northwest, is about 14 miles long, and is asymmetric with a steeper west flank. Bounding the anticline on the northeast and east is the Capitol Reef monocline, the northern part of the Waterpocket Fold. Strata in the area are broken by steeply-dipping normal faults with small displacements, except for the Teasdale fault which has a maximum displacement of over 1,000 feet. Jointing is prominent in some formations.

The major orogenic movement in the area is believed to be late Upper Cretaceous to early Tertiary. Epeirogenic uplift occurred intermittently throughout Tertiary and perhaps Quaternary time.