Flood traps through space and time and their bearing on some problems of geotectonics

Abstract

A study of world stratigraphy reveals, somewhat unexpectedly, that there were extensive basalt flows in the early Precambrian, but the Upper Precambrian and the whole of the Palaeozoic Era, with some insignificant exceptions, are practically devoid of flood basalts. In fact there were very few cruptions between about 1000 M.yr. and about 200 M.yr, ago. Since Upper Triassic time, however, basalt floods have come to cover very extensive areas in both the hemispheres, and the activity is continuing almost unabated.