ABSTRACT
Coastline in the Badger Bay-Seal Bay area of north-central
Newfoundland exposes the thickest and least disrupted section of
Ordovician rocks in Newfoundland's Central Volcanic Belt. The
following conformable stratigraphic sequence is observed: 1) >5
km. of variegated mafic and silicic submarine volcanics and
volcaniclastics of lower Ordovician age; 2) a thin (<.5 km.)
sequence consisting of thin bedded red and green argillites,
manganiferous cherts, bioturbated cherts and black sulferous
graptolite-bearing argillites of Caradocian age; 3) >1.2 km. of
quartz-rich sandstones of upper Ordovician age. Correlative
sequences occur to the east in the Fortune Harbour Peninsula area
and on New World Island. Together they record Early Ordovician
island arc volcanism, Medial Ordovician cessation of volcanism and
subsidence, and Medial through Late Ordovician uplift and erosion
of a terrane to the north or west. Analysis of the detrital
mineralogy and provenance of the Late Ordovician sediments
indicates that they were derived from strata now exposed in the
Burlington Peninsula area of western Newfoundland. This places an
independent constraint on the age of Fleur de Lys metamorphism and
deformation recorded in that area. It is concluded that ophiolite
obduction on the Western Platform, Fleur de Lys metamorphism and
deformation in the Burlington Peninsula area, and cessation of
arc-type volcanism in the Notre Dame Bay area occurred
synchronously. These results support the hypothesis that ophiolite
obduction in western Newfoundland resulted from the collision of
an island arc with an Atlantic-type continental margin during
Medial Ordovician time.
Nelson, K.D., 1979. Geology of the Badger Bay-Seal Bay area,
north-central Newfoundland. Unpublished PhD dissertation, State
University of New York at Albany. 184pp., +xi; 3 folded plates
(maps)
University at Albany Science Library call number: SCIENCE
MIC Film QE 199 N35X
Copies of this PhD dissertation can be ordered
from Proquest UMI
Front matter (title,
table of contents, abstract, acknowledgements) - 0.3MB pdf
file
Photo pages in dissertation
(coloured
photos
with captions) 14MB pdf file
Plate 1 - Coastline
Geology of the Badger Bay - Seal Bay area
(coloured outcrop
map, scale ~1:17,340) - 21MB pdf file
Plate 2 - Generalized
geologic map of Notre Dame Bay, Newfoundland
(uncoloured geological map)
- 1MB pdf file
Plate 3 - Airphoto
lineaments, Badger Bay-seal Bay area, Newfoundland
(uncoloured lineament map) -
1MB pdf file
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