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SITE GEOLOGY <br />The Fontanari property is located at the mouth of Rapid Creek <br />on a complex and deeply dissected alluvial fan and debris flow <br />sequence which involves several hundred acres. The underlying <br />Mesaverde sandstone and shale crop out in several locations <br />near the property. Coal beds underneath the site have been <br />removed by extensive mining operations which portal near the <br />Colorado River. Reportedly, surface settlement has occurred <br />on the subject property as a result of the mining. <br />The property is within a larger area <br />Geological Survey as "A-4" on Plate 2 <br />Resources Survey of Mesa County". The <br />as "alluvial fan, probable sand/grave <br />adapted from this Survey map is attached <br />mapped by the Colorado <br />in the report "Mineral <br />symbol A-4 is described <br />1 resource". A drawing <br />to this report. <br />Western Slope Flagstone Quarry No. 2 <br />Mr. Rudy Fontanari presently operates a quarry on his property <br />to produce primarily gravel, cobbles, and boulders in the <br />southwest corner of Section 35, T 10 S, R 98 W, Sixth Principal <br />Meridian. The existing pit operates under current permits for <br />an area of 9.55 acres from the Colorado Mined Land Reclamation <br />Board, Mesa County, and other authorities. The materials from <br />the quarry have commercial value, after separation, for uses <br />such as riprap, roadfill, landscaping stone, and other <br />construction needs. <br />Description of the Alluvial Fan Materials <br />Based on exposures in nearby roadcuts and canyon walls, <br />excavation at Quarry No. Z, and the five test pits by Ute Water, <br />the materials in the alluvial fans are generally a layer of <br />fine grained soil overlying an unsorted stratum of all sizes <br />from silt and clay up to 10-foot boulders. The high fraction <br />of very large rock sizes and the large amount of fines silt <br />and clay) in the lower layer indicate that this material was <br />transported in a very high energy, debris-choked stream thaC <br />could move giant boulders. The gradient of the present Rapid <br />Creek is about 600 feet per mile, as the drainage descends from <br />its head at 10,000-foot elevation on Grand Mesa down to its <br />confluence with the Colorado River at about elevation 4,800 <br />feet. The large volume of stream flow that would have been <br />necessary to move such a volume of material is believed to have <br />resulted from the melting of an ice cap on Grand Mesa in <br />Pleistocene times. The debris-laden stream moved down the steep <br />gradient of Rapid Creek and deposited its load as alluvial fans, <br />and possibly debris flows, as the stream gradient lessened near <br />the Colorado River. <br />2 <br />