Discussion

Abstract

Professor J. S utton asked if the authors regarded the thickness of 9 km as the true thickness, or were they dealing with a succession of tapering flows stacked on each other ? Could they throw any new light on the coastal dyke swarm first described by Wager, whose interpretation had recently been questioned ? Finally, was there in East Greenland any evidence of Tertiary igneous rocks older than the lava flows? Bearing in mind the new ages presented in the paper it was presumably conceivable that the igneous activity so well developed in Western Scotland might have extended into east Greenland to be followed later in the Tertiary by the volcanics so interestingly discussed in this paper. Professor D. T. D onovan asked for elaboration of the view, based as he understood on evidence of rock magnetism, that the great thickness of lavas in the area was erupted over a very short period of time. While the commencement of activity is now well dated as late Paleocene, the Kap Dalton Beds which overlie the lava pile are dated, on molluscan evidence, as middle or even late Eocene (Hassan 1953). Thus on stratigraphical evidence half or more of the Eocene would be available for the eruptive episode. D r C. H. E melevs enquired if there was clear evidence for major normal, coastparallel faulting affecting the basalt lavas but prior to the deposition of the Kap Dalton Formation ? I would agree that at Kap Brewster there is clear evidence of post Kap Dalton