CONJUGATE FRACTURES

When a rock is compressed under conditions of brittle deformation, it fails by shear giving rise to the formation of two fractures with movement sense opposed and acute angle faces the direction in which the rock is shortened. The fractures may give rise to faults if the shear stress exceeds the normal stress times the coefficient of shearing resistance. Above are conjugate strike slip faults in the gneisses of Ghisauli near Jaunpur in Central India.