Geology and Tectonics of the Central California Coastal Region, San Francisco to Monterey

1990 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert E. Garrison ◽  
H. Gary Greene ◽  
Karen R. Hicks ◽  
Gerald E. Weber ◽  
Thomas L. Wright
Keyword(s):  
San Francisco ◽  
Coastal Region ◽  
Central California

Developing a high-resolution climatology for the Central California coastal region

2007 ◽  
Vol 27 (16) ◽  
pp. 2135-2161 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hyun-Sook Kim ◽  
Avijit Gangopadhyay ◽  
Leslie K. Rosenfeld ◽  
Frank L. Bub
Keyword(s):  
High Resolution ◽  
Coastal Region ◽  
Central California

scholarly journals Correlation of the Rockland Ash Bed, a 400,000-Year-Old Stratigraphic Marker in Northern California and Western Nevada, and Implications for Middle Pleistocene Paleogeography of Central California

1985 ◽  
Vol 23 (2) ◽  
pp. 236-257 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrei M. Sarna-Wojcicki ◽  
Charles E. Meyer ◽  
Harry R. Bowman ◽  
N. Timothy Hall ◽  
Paul C. Russell ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
San Francisco ◽  
Hot Spring ◽  
Temporal Correlation ◽  
Middle Pleistocene ◽  
Northern California ◽  
Central California ◽  
Mohawk Valley ◽  
Glaciofluvial Deposits ◽  
Lassen Peak ◽  
Great Valley

Outcrops of an ash bed at several localities in northern California and western Nevada belong to a single air-fall ash layer, the informally named Rockland ash bed, dated at about 400,000 yr B.P. The informal Rockland pumice tuff breccia, a thick, coarse, compound tephra deposit southwest of Lassen Peak in northeastern California, is the near-source equivalent of the Rockland ash bed. Relations between initial thickness of the Rockland ash bed and distances to eruptive source suggest that the eruption was at least as great as that of the Mazama ash from Crater Lake, Oregon. Identification of the Rockland tephra allows temporal correlation of associated middle Pleistocene strata of diverse facies in separate depositional basins. Specifically, marine, littoral, estuarine, and fluvial strata of the Hookton and type Merced formations correlate with fluvial strata of the Santa Clara Formation and unnamed alluvium of Willits Valley and the Hollister area, in northwestern and west-central California, and with lacustrine beds of Mohawk Valley, fluvial deposits of the Red Bluff Formation of the eastern Sacramento Valley, and fluvial and glaciofluvial deposits of Fales Hot Spring, Carson City, and Washoe Valley areas in northeastern California and western Nevada. Stratigraphic relations of the Rockland ash bed and older tephra layers in the Great Valley and near San Francisco suggest that the southern Great Valley emerged above sea level about 2 my ago, that its southerly outlet to the ocean was closed sometime after about 2 my ago, and that drainage from the Great Valley to the ocean was established near the present, northerly outlet in the vicinity of San Francisco Bay about 0.6 my ago.

The Investigation to Identify the SS Jacob Luckenbach – Using Technology to Locate a Hidden Source of Oil that Caused Years of Impacts and the Future Implications of Sunken Shipwrecks

2003 ◽  
Vol 2003 (1) ◽  
pp. 1219-1224 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gabrielle G. McGrath ◽  
Heather A. Parker-Hall ◽  
John A. Tarpley ◽  
Alan Nack
Keyword(s):  
San Francisco ◽  
Oil Spills ◽  
Task Force ◽  
The United States ◽  
Alternative Possibilities ◽  
Central California ◽  
The Future ◽  
Common Murres ◽  
Working Together ◽  
Golden Gate Bridge

ABSTRACT From 1992 until 2002, oiled birds, predominantly common murres, were found along the central California coastline during the winter months, but no significant oil slicks were observed. These repeat “mystery” oil spills puzzled investigators for 10 years while several similar cases of bird impacts occurred from November through February to varying degrees each year. In 2001, the same pattern began yet again. The response to oiled wildlife was the most significant to date. Extending over 220 miles of coastline, more than 2000 birds were recovered and transported for care to California's Oiled Wildlife Care Network (OWCN) facility. Motivated by this serious threat to wildlife, federal and state investigators utilized the historical data collected in previous cases combined with current technology to solve the mystery. An extensive Oil Spill Source Identification Task Force was formed consisting of 20 federal and state agents working together to get to the source of the problem. Through these current technologies, including oil sample analysis; satellite, aerial, and on-water observations; and hindcasting, the Task Force was able to eliminate alternative possibilities and focus the investigation on the last potential source, a sunken shipwreck. The Task Force sifted through four different databases of sunken vessels indicating over 700 shipwrecks off of the San Francisco coast alone to establish eight ships as potential targets. During the first underwater search planned to visually investigate each of these vessels, oil was located in the surface waters above the SS JACOB LUCKENBACH, a C-3 freighter sunk in 1953, 17 miles southwest of the Golden Gate Bridge. Analyses of oil samples collected from the vessel's tanks confirmed the LUCKENBACH as the source impacting California seabirds. Further research showed that all possible responsible parties have been absolved of any liability regarding the sinking of the LUCKENBACH. After spending over $3 million on the 1997–1998 and 2001–2002 incidents for the wildlife response alone and with no party from which to recover the funds, the spill response community is faced with an enormous financial task for the future: responding to inevitable oil spills off the coasts of the United States from thousands of deteriorating shipwrecks sunk decades ago with, in most cases, no responsible parties.

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