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Falkland Plateau evolution and a mobile southernmost South America

Barker, P. F.. 1999 Falkland Plateau evolution and a mobile southernmost South America. In: Cameron, N.R.; Bate, R.H.; Clure, V.S., (eds.) The oil and gas habitats of the South Atlantic. London, Geological Society of London, 403-408. (Geological Society London, Special Publications, 153, 153).

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Abstract/Summary

Assessment of southwest Gondwana break-up and its implications for regional hydrocarbon prospectivity must now take into account the origin of the southeast margin of the Falkland Islands as a volcanic rifted continental margin, and of the floor of the major part of the Falkland Plateau Basin as elevated oceanic crust. A reconstruction of the Falkland Plateau against southern Africa shows a southward extensional widening of the Outeniqua Basin across the line of the Falkland-Agulhas Fracture Zone, changing from stretched continental to oceanic crustal structure. Such a model for Outeniqua Basin opening, and the independent westward and clockwise rotation of the Falkland Islands block, suggests that southernmost South America was also a collection of microplates moving independently within a generally extensional environment in the Late Triassic-Early Jurassic. This is incompatible with assumptions of a rigid southernmost South America over this time, and a dominant role for a continuous dextral strike-slip Gastre Fault.

Item Type: Publication - Book Section
Digital Object Identifier (DOI): https://doi.org/10.1144/GSL.SP.1999.153.01.24
Programmes: BAS Programmes > Pre 2000 programme
ISSN: 0305-8719
Date made live: 20 Aug 2013 09:59 +0 (UTC)
URI: https://nora.nerc.ac.uk/id/eprint/503006

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