Sevier orogeny Sevier thrust faults. The Sevier orogeny was preceded by several other mountain-building events including the Nevadan orogeny, the Sonoman orogeny, and the Antler orogeny, and partially overlapped in time and space with the Laramide orogeny. Since the Sevier and Laramide orogenies occurred at similar times and places, they are sometimes confused. In general the Sevier orogeny defines a more western compressional event that took advantage of weak bedding planes in overlying Paleozoic and Mesozoic sedimentary rock. As the crust was shortened, pressure was transferred eastward along the weak sedimentary layers, producing “thin-skinned” thrust faults that generally get younger to the
Antler orogeny due to sea-level rise in the Cambrian rather than displacement from an ocean basin. The sedimentary effects of the Antler orogeny are well known and well described in many published reports, but the exact nature of that event and the driving force remain unsettled. Among the unanswered questions are these: what aspect of plate tectonics was involved; what effect did the Alamo impact event have; why did marine basins appear in the area of general uplift; why did the western facies assemblage, and not the eastern assemblage, include bedded chert, basaltic bodies, barite deposits, and sulfide deposits. Antler orogeny The