Calaveras Fault

The Calaveras Fault is a major branch of the San Andreas Fault located in northern California in the San Francisco Bay Area. To the east of the Hayward-Rodgers Creek fault, the Calaveras fault extends 123 km, splaying from the San Andreas fault near Hollister and terminating at Danville at its northern end. It runs east of the San Andreas, diverging from it in the vicinity of Hollister, California, and is responsible for the formation of the Calaveras Valley there. Between the San Andreas Fault and the Calaveras Fault lies the Hayward Fault, which diverges from the Calaveras Fault east of San Jose, California. To the east lies the Clayton-Marsh Creek-Greenville Fault. These four fault structures are the some of the major faults in California at the latitude of San Francisco. All are right lateral moving strike-slip faults.

The Calaveras Fault was named for Calaveras Creek in Santa Clara County east of San Jose where it was first identified. ("Calaveras" is Spanish for "skulls".) "Calaveras" is also the name of a California county in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada mountains, some 100 miles (160 km) east of Santa Clara County, far from the Calaveras Fault.

Read more about Calaveras Fault:  Related Faults, Tectonic Forces, Nearby Cities, Seismic Activity, Hayward Fault Connection, Recent Assessment

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    I often accuse my finest acquaintances of an immense frivolity; for, while there are manners and compliments we do not meet, we do not teach one another the lessons of honesty and sincerity that the brutes do, or of steadiness and solidity that the rocks do. The fault is commonly mutual; however, for we do not habitually demand any more of each other.
    Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)