Early extension in the Late Archaean northeastern Eastern Goldfields Province, Yilgarn Craton, Western Australia

Abstract

Listen

Translate article

A series of linked extensional detachments, transfer faults, and sediment- and volcanic-filled half-grabens that pre-date regional folding are described in the Late Archaean Margaret anticline, Eastern Goldfields Province, Yilgarn Craton, Western Australia. Coeval structures and rock units include layer-parallel extensional detachments, transfer faults (high-angle rotational faults rooted in the detachments and linking layer-parallel shear zones with varying amounts of extension); felsic intrusions, either as granitoids emplaced in or below the detachments, or as fine-grained intrusive bodies emplaced above the detachments and controlled by the high-angle faults; and half-grabens controlled by the high-angle faults and filled with clastic sedimentary and volcanic rocks. At least 1500 m of section is excised across the detachments. The detachments and high-angle faults are folded by the east-northeast regional compression that formed the Margaret anticline. Extensional deformation in the Margaret anticline is correlated with the regionally recognised felsic magmatism and associated volcanic and volcaniclastic basin fill dated at approximately 2685–2670 Ma across the Eastern Goldfields Province. This suggests the extensional event was province-wide and post-dated initial greenstone deposition (at around 2705 Ma) but pre-dated regional compressive deformation. We suggest the extension is the result of a thermal anomaly in the crust, generated by the insulating effect of a thick pile (of the order of 10 km or greater) of mafic and ultramafic volcanic rocks on precursor Archaean felsic crust. The thermal anomaly has generated renewed production of felsic and mafic volcanic rocks, coeval with uplift and extension in the upper crust.