Evidenze morfologiche di tettonica recente sul margine orientale della Maiella (Appennino centrale)

The Maiella mountain is one of the highest elevations of the Central Apennines. Its huge eastern scarp is also one of the most spectacular tectonic landforms of the belt. The escarpment represents the forelimb of a thrust-related anticline belonging to the Neogene Adriatic-verging thrust system. Nevertheless, the Maiella structural high partly results from the shortening of a pre-orogenic horst bounded by antithetic normal faults. In the lower segment of the Vallone di S. Spirito, one of the main canyons which cuts in the scarp, it is possible to recognize a damming event caused by the extrusion of a tectonic wedge. On the base of the characters of the narrow gorge engraved in the natural dam, the related tectonic episode is referable to a relatively recent moment, even if not easy to be precisely defined, of the Pleistocene. Thus, it is possible to infer that the Maiella morphostructure has not ceased its activity in the Upper Pliocene, as reported in the geological literature, but has been active also during the Quaternary.