San Andreas Fault Impact

Cabo San Lucas can be located farther South of California. As we know many map makers were not too clear on how the world looked like, because they didn’t posses all the fancy new things we have now a days. Back in the early 1500’s Baja was depicted as an island. This was later dis-proven by Franciso de Ulloa who was sent by Hernan Cortes to explore the area. Ullola sailed along the Baja California Side, and rounded the tip of Baja California which is now known as Cabo San Lucas. This Baja peninsular, which is separated into two Mexican states (Baja California North, and Baja California South) stretches from near the U.S border to Cabo San Lucas (approx. 747 miles).

  Cabo San Lucas is surrounded by the Pacific Ocean as well as the Gulf of California, which may also be known as the Sea of Coretz. Archaeologists have thought that peninsula which holds Cabo San Lucas had been separated from the mainland of Mexico by means of the San Andreas Fault.  This motion of movement caused the Baja Peninsula to start drifting away from the mainland of Mexico nearly five million years ago. The San Andreas Fault is where the North American plate and the Pacific Plate touch. The San Andreas Fault slices California in two down to the Mexican border. 

  The San Andreas Fault is a transform fault. A transform type of interaction means a side-by-side motion of movement. 

 

This does not mean that there is a huge amount of movement within the fault area, but rather a small movement. Because of this transform boundary many different rocks may be seen. Since the San Andreas Fault is near 28 million years old, rock types from great distances have been discovered where rocks from different locations and origins. Such as the Salinian block of granite (central and northern California originated in Southern California) and some may say northern Mexico.




Sources Used:
 http://geology.about.com/od/geology_ca/ig/safsouth/safsouthredisland.htm
http://geology.com/articles/san-andreas-fault.shtml
http://www.allaboutbaja.com/seaofcortez.html
http://www.americanjourneys.org/aj-113/summary/

http://www.cabosanlucas.net/fast_facts/geographical_summary.php 
 http://www.worldatlas.com/aatlas/infopage/baja.htm
Professor Allen Lecture