The Maritimes Basin of Atlantic Canada: basin creation and destruction in collisional zone of Pangea. In: The Phanerozoic sedimentary basins of the United States and Canada

• Main Authors: GIBLING M. R, CULSHAW N, RYGEL MC, PASCUCCI, Vincenzo
• Other Authors: Andrew D. Miall, MIALL A.D., Gibling, M. R., Culshaw, N, Rygel, Mc, Pascucci, Vincenzo
• Format: Book Part
• Language: English
• Published: Elsevier B.V. 2008
• Subjects: Canada; canada basin
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/11388/70527; https://doi.org/10.1016/S1874-5997(08)00006-3

During the final assembly of Pangea, the Maritimes Basin of Atlantic Canada was tectonically active for B120 Myr from the Mid-Devonian to the Early Permian, following terrane accretion and ocean closure in the region. The basin’s history records a prolonged period of convergence that post-dated the collision of Gondwana and Laurussia. The 12 km of basin fill was laid down in suites of periodically connected depocenters, and parts of the region experienced a polycyclic basin history, with repeated subsidence and inversion of fault-bounded depocenters, many associated with strike-slip faults. During two periods in the basin history, sedimentation overstepped fault zones under a regime of thermal subsidence to blanket much of the region. The basin fills are largely continental but include one open-marine interval with evaporite accumulation (Mississippian), as well as restricted-marine intervals, reflecting progressive loss of oceanic connection. Basinal architecture testifies to rapid subsidence against a backdrop of glacioeustatic influence in a paleoequatorial setting. Volcanics and intrusions were especially prominent during Devonian to Mississippian convergence, and halokinesis greatly influenced later basin development. A partial analogue for the Maritimes Basin is provided by modern Turkey and environs, situated in the Arabia–Eurasia collision zone, where strike-slip faults and basin formation record continued post-collisional convergence adjacent to the Zagros thrust belt. Local crustal thickening, delamination of subducting crust, volcanism, extensional zones, and basin creation along crustal-scale faults are prominent in this region.