When the fault plane is vertical there is no hanging wall or footwall.
Normal fault hanging wall and footwall.
They bound many of the mountain ranges of the world and many of the rift valleys found along spreading margins.
Low angle normal faults with regional tectonic significance may be designated detachment faults.
The strike is the direction of the fault.
Its strike and its dip.
In a normal fault the hanging wall moves downward relative to the footwall.
Normal faults are common.
A downthrown block between two normal faults dipping towards each other is a graben.
Normal faults occur in areas undergoing extension stretching.
An upthrown block between two normal faults dipping away from each other is a horst.
Where the fault plane is sloping as with normal and reverse faults the upper side is the hanging wall and the lower side is the footwall.
The hanging wall slides down relative to the footwall.
Any fault plane can be completely described with two measurements.
If you imagine undoing the motion of a normal fault you will undo the stretching and thus shorten the horizontal distance between two points on either side of the fault.
Normal dip slip faults are produced by vertical compression as earth s crust lengthens.