Regional Geology of Northern Yukon1

Abstract

ABSTRACT Structurally the northernmost Yukon is part of the Eastern Cordilleran System, and in many respects it is an eastward extension of Brooks Range and the adjacent structural provinces of northern Alaska. Comparisons may also be made between the geological history of the northern Alaska - northern Yukon region and that of the Canadian Arctic Islands, a fact that has led to some speculation concerning the possible contiguity of these two areas throughout much of Phanerozoic time. This report will deal with British and Barn Mountains, Old Crow Plain and Dave Lord Ridge. Richardson Mountains will not be discussed in detail. The Ordovician, Silurian and possibly much of the Cambrian are represented east of Dave Lord Ridge by approximately 10,000 ft of fine-grained clastic sediments, the Road River Formation. Rocks of similar age in British and Barn Mountains and Brooks Range are strongly deformed metasediments (Neruokpuk Formation). Deposition of the Road River Formation took place in a basin named the Richardson Trough, which may have been a southward extension of the Franklinian Geosyncline of the Canadian Arctic Islands. A major tectonic episode, the Ellesmerian Orogeny, affected northern Yukon, northern Alaska and the Arctic Islands in several separate phases during the Devonian. The Neruokpuk underwent low-grade regional metamorphism at this time and several granite stocks were emplaced, including that at Mount Sedgwick in British Mountains. Thick syntectonic and post-tectonic clastic wedges were formed nearly everywhere near the present Alaskan and Canadian Arctic coasts, except within the Yukon, as a result of a mid-Devonian pulse of the Ellesmerian Orogeny. Between the Early Mississippian and the Late Triassic the Lisburne Group and the Sadlerochit and Shublik formations were deposited. The Lisburne and Sadlerochit are two of the most important reservoir rocks at Prudhoe Bay. Lisburne sediments, mainly carbonates, are confined (within the report area) to British and Barn Mountains. The Sadlerochit Formation (coarse-grained, porous clastic deposits) is well developed in the Dave Lord Ridge area but is thin or absent in northeastern British Mountains. The Shublik is typically developed in British Mountains. The principal sediment source area for northern Alaska and northern Yukon during the Cambrian to Jurassic period appears to have been located off the 1 Manuscript received February 9, 1972. 2 Shell Canada, P.O. Box 880, Calgary, Alberta. Present address: Institute of Sedimentary and Petroleum Geology, Calgary. This paper has developed from a field and photogeological study carried out between July 1970 and March 1971 while the author was in the employ of J. C. Sproule and Associates Ltd. The project was carried out for Charter Oil Company Ltd. Both these companies are to be thanked for granting me permission to publish the material. C. W. Drew provided an invaluable preliminary photogeological interpretation of the project area. R. Cech was my very energetic field assistant. The ideas presented herein have benefited considerably from discussions with D. K. Norris, I. Tailleur and W. O. Kupsch, all of whom have read the manuscript. Finally, grateful thanks are due to Shell Canada Limited for providing me with drafting and typing services. L. H. Taylor drew the illustrations and Mrs. J. Barnes typed the final manuscript. End_Page 81------------------------- present Arctic Coast and may have been part of the same source area that contributed detritus to the Canadian Arctic Islands region. Jurassic, Cretaceous and Tertiary sediments are almost exclusively clastic in northern Yukon. They were derived from several sources including an ancestral Brooks Range and Campbell Uplift of the Inuvik area. The Cretaceous marks a major shift in sediment dispersal patterns, particularly in northern Alaska, as a result of large-scale changes in the distribution of land and water masses at this time. These may have been caused by major continental-drift movements in the area of the Arctic Ocean Basin. A major tectonic episode, the Eurekan Orogeny, took place between Middle Cretaceous and Early Tertiary times in northern Yukon (and in Alaska and the Arctic Islands), involving all but the most recent sediments. No igneous activity has been recorded in connection with the Eurekan Orogeny in northern Yukon but most of the structural deformation of the post-Devonian rocks dates from this time.