By Associated PressDIXIE VALLEY, NEV., Dec. 20 Geographers may have to revise their maps because of the earthquake last Thursday which caused awesome changes in the terrain of this sparsely settled area.The quake centering in this remote valley was felt in five western states.Scientists who converged on mile high Dixie Valley found gaping fissures that scarred the base of surrounding mountains for 26 miles.Snowcapped peaks looking down on the desolate valley either were shoved upward a few feet or the valley floor dropped because of the violent quake, they said. Geographers wont know which it is until readings are taken of the mountains.Prof. David Slemmons, University of Nevada earthquake expert, flew over the area in West Central Nevada about 110 miles east of Reno mapping the tremendous fissures.The quake was without doubt one of the most important ever recorded in the United States, Slemmons said. This, he explained is in terms of ground replacement.Slemmons measured three newly opened faults, one of which ran along the Stillwater range on the east side of the valley. Another 26 mile slash was discovered at the southwest part of the Clan Alpine range. A third fissure about 12 miles long opened just east of the Clan Alpine.A reporter who drove across the desert to the base of one of the faults found a frightening sight warm water gushing from the mountain fastness and raging along the quake caused gash. The trench measured from 12 feet deep to 30 feet across.This is in an area where water had never been found, at least in appreciable quantities. A few ranchers graze cattle on the valley floor, but there is no settlement in miles.The gashes along the base of the mountain look as if a giant had ripped the terrain with a jagged knife mile after mile and then had torn it apart with his hands. Had the quake occurred in a populated area, Slemmons said, I hesitate to think of the death and destruction it would have caused.Six families live during the summer in the bleak valley, roughly twice the size of Manhattan Island. Sheriff George Wilkins said a few ranchers were in the valley during the quake but none was injured.Slemmons found part of a new fault where one side is 20 feet lower than on the other side. He said this is possibly the greatest vertical shifting of earth ever recorded in the United States!The San Francisco quake of 1906, by comparison, caused only a 3 foot vertical displacement. About 700 persons were killed in that tremor.