The Mount Wright Arc: A Cambrian subduction system developed on the continental margin of East Gondwana, Koonenberry Belt, eastern Australia

Abstract

The Mount Wright Arc, in the Koonenberry Belt in eastern Australia, is associated with two early to middle Cambrian lithostratigraphic groups developed onto the Late Neoproterozoic volcanic passive margin of East Gondwana. The Gnalta Group includes a calc-alkaline basalt-andesite-dacite suite (Mount Wright Volcanics), interpreted to represent the volcanic component of the arc. Volcaniclastic Gnalta Group rocks now buried in the Bancannia Trough represent the continental back-arc, developed immediately behind the arc in a manner analogous to the modern Taupo Volcanic Zone of New Zealand. East of the Gnalta Group is the Ponto Group, a deep marine sedimentary package that includes tholeiitic lavas (Bittles Tank Volcanics) and felsic tuffs, interpreted as part of a fore-arc sequence. The configuration of these units suggests the Mount Wright Arc developed on continental crust in response to west-dipping subduction along the East Gondwana margin, in contrast with some models for Cambrian convergence on other sections of the Delamerian Orogen, which invoke east-dipping subduction and arc accretion by arc-continent collision. This convergent margin was deformed by the middle Cambrian Delamerian Orogeny, which involved initial co-axial shortening followed by sinistral transpression, and oroclinal folding around the edge of the Curnamona Province.