Multi-stage late- and post-orogenic deformation history of the innermost Hellenic fold-and-thrust belt from a detailed paleostress reconstruction (Koziakas-Itamos Mts., Western Thessaly, Central Greece)

The NNW-SSE trending Koziakas-Itamos Mts of Western Thessaly, Central Greece, constitute the innermost part of the External Hellenides, i.e., the Hellenic fold-and-thrust belt, formed from the Tertiary orogenic (alpine) processes due to collision between the Apulia and Eurasia plates. Along these mountains, large ophiolite masses have thrust towards WSW over Mesozoic carbonate and clastic rocks, which in turn thrust over the Tertiary flysch rocks of the Pindos Unit. The mountains bound the NW-SE trending late-alpine Mesohellenic Trough to the east, filled with Late Eocene to Miocene molasse-type sediments, and the younger Thessaly basin filled up with Neogene and Quaternary sediments.

 

A detailed paleostress reconstruction based on the fault-slip analysis and the stress inversion through the TR method (TRM) unravels a multi-stage deformation history for the innermost parts of the Hellenic fold-and-thrust belt. More precisely, the late orogenic faulting deformation temporally constrained in Late Oligocene to Middle Miocene was originally driven by stress regimes that define an ENE-WSW ‘real’ compression normal to the orogenic fabric associated with mainly NE-directed back thrusts. The compression shifted to ‘hybrid’ with the activation of oblique- and strike-slip faults. After that stage, the hybrid compression predominates with counterclockwise changes in the trend of the greatest principal stress axis (σ₁) from ENE-WSW to NNE-SSW. The last stage of the late-orogenic faulting deformation is an NW-SE orogen parallel extension segmenting and differentiating the NNW-SSE orogenic fabric along its strike.

 

Post-orogenic faulting deformation is driven by extensional stress regimes that caused the basin-and-range topography and the formation of well-established basins filled up with Late Miocene and younger sediments like the Thessaly basin. In particular, an ENE-WSW pure extension normal to the orogenic fabric has been defined. A general counterclockwise rotation of the least principal stress axis (σ3) occurred, initially giving rise to NE-SW  extension-transtension during Late Miocene-Pliocene and NNE-SSW extension-transtension since the Quaternary.