Pasadena orogeny Pasadena orogeny Pasadena orogeny is a mountain building event. Conventionally it refers to the formation of mountains in mainly Southern California during the Pleistocene and lasting until the present day; originally it referred to the uplift of the San Gabriel Mountains. The Pasadena orogeny is a major Late Quaternary-modern event of mountain formation, which took place in the middle or perhaps late Pleistocene or to the present-day. It is also known as the "Coast Ranges orogeny" or considered to be part of the Cascadian orogeny or Alpide Orogeny. Finally, the term "Pasadena orogeny" is sometimes applied to all very recent
Andean orogeny and then to the opening of the Drake Passage 45 million years ago. The separation from Antarctica changed the tectonics of the Fuegian Andes into a transpressive regime with transform faults. About 15 million years ago in the Miocene the Chile Ridge begun to subduct beneath the southern tip of Patagonia (55° S). The point of subduction, the triple junction has gradually moved to the north and lies at present at 47° S. The subduction of the ridge has created a northward moving "window" or gap in the asthenosphere beneath South America. Andean orogeny The Andean orogeny () is an