Kinematics and structural properties of an active fault zone in the Sila Massif (Northern Calabria, Italy)

In this paper we analyse the geometry, kinematics and dimensionalcharacteristics of fault segments in the northern-central sectorof the Sila Massif (Calabria). The fault zone (named here LF)extends beyond the Ampollino Lake and the Arvo River, and isthought to be the seismogenic structure responsible for the 1638earthquake. Our data show that LF is composed of two main rightsteppingsegments arranged en-échelon. The stepover zone correspondsto a relay zone between the two active segments, as provedby the occurrence, in the area, of faulted Holocene sediments. Thepresence of compressive and extensional jogs with associated pushups and sag ponds along the fault trace, as well as the overall architectureof the fault zone, indicate that the LF is a NW-SE strikingleft-lateral feature. The structural and dimensional properties of thefault zone, also suggest that active deformation processes associatedto LF include mechanical interaction between neighbouring faultsegments indicating that those may be considered as part of a singleseismogenic structure.