AWATERE'S GEOLOGY

Evening Post, Volume CXV, Issue 139, 15 June 1933, Page 15

AWATERE'S GEOLOGY

A. paper was read last night by Mr. (ij. C. King to the Geological Section o± jthe AVellington Philosophical Societyon .'the geology of the Awatcro clistnet, Marlborough. The speaker referred briefly to previous geological investigations in r'the district and recalled that, with Nelson and Auckland, it was one of. the districts described by' Dr. Hochstetter in 1860.

The area examined, some '250 square •miles, was shown to bo broken up into a number of earth blocks bounded by •.powerful faults on one of: which movement took place jn 18i8 and 1835. Tim faults belonged to two closely connected .series, one running in a north-easterly direction and one nearly clue cast. They seemed to nave been produced by strong c-.ompressivo forces within the earth directed towards the north-west, causing the earth blocks to be strongly tilted towards the north.

The later (Tertiary) cocks of the dia■trict were shown to be divisible into three series, each of which coul.. be: identified by its characteristic fossil shell-fish. The conglomerate rocks'of White Bluffs, near the mouth of the Wairau River, were shown to be much older than has been supposed, and to be part of the- middle series. The speaker compared the rocks with those of Palliser Bay and Taranaki. Many points in. the paper were discussed; particularly the evidence as to the ago and relation of the formation. !Mr. Maepherson raised a discussion as in the nature of the fault movements. This became general and hail to lie <ul.jfwrrxvl to'the'next meeting.