Abstract - The total throw across a fault zone may not occur entirely on a single fault strand but may be distributed onto several strands or may be accommodated by distributed deformation within or adjacent to the fault zone. Here we conduct a quantitative analysis of the partitioning of throw into three components, the throw accommodated by a) the largest fault strand, b) subsidiary faults and c) continuous deformation in the form of bed rotation in sympathy with the fault downthrow direction. This analysis is applied to seven, seismic scale fault zones at outcrop resolution (maximum throw 50m), that were mapped over a four-year period during opencast lignite mining within the late Miocene to Pliocene, Ptolemais Basin, West Macedonia, Greece. The analysis shows that the fault zones offsetting the lignite-marl sequence are more localized at higher throws with progressively more of the total throw accommodated by the largest fault strand. Normal drag, which can account for up to 12 m of the total throw, accommodates a lower proportion of the total throw on larger faults. It appears that initial fault segmentation is the main control on the degree of, and spatial variation in, fault throw partitioning.
In: The Geometry and Growth of Normal Faults. (Edited by Childs, C., Holdsworth, R. E., Jackson, C. A.-L., Manzocchi, T., Walsh, J. J. & Yielding, G.). Geological Society of London, Special Publication 439, doi.org/10.1144/SP439, 2015.