Hurricane Mountain Formation melange: history of Cambro-Ordovician accretion of the Boundary Mountains terrane within the northern Appalachian orthotectonic zone

Conference · Tue Jan 01 04:00:00 EST 1985 · Geol. Soc. Am., Abstr. Programs; (United States)

OSTI ID:6651962

Boone, G M; Boudette, E L

The Hurricane Mountain Formation (HMF) melange and associated ophiolitic and volcanogenic formations of Cambrian and lowermost Ordovician age bound the SE margin of the Precambrian Y (Helikian) Chain Lakes Massif in western Maine. HMF melange matrix, though weakly metamorphosed, contains a wide variety of exotic greenschist to amphibolite facies blocks as components of its polymictic assemblage, but blocks of high-grade cratonal rocks such as those of Chain Lakes or Grenville affinity are lacking. Formations of melange exposed in structural culminations of Cambrian and Ordovician rocks NE of the HMF in Maine and in the Fournier Group in New Brunswick are lithologically similar and probably tectonically correlative with the HMF; taken together, they may delineate a common pre-Middle Ordovician tectonic boundary. The authors infer that the Hurricane Mountain and St. Daniel melange belts define the SE and NW margins of the Boundary Mountains accreted terrane (BMT), which may consist of cratonal basement of Chain Lakes affinity extending from eastern Gaspe (deBroucker and St. Julien, 1985) to north-central New Hampshire. The Laurentian continental margin, underlain by Grenville basement, underplated the NW margin of this terrane, marked by the SDF suture zone, in late Cambrian to early Ordovician time, while terranes marked by Cambrian to Tremadocian (.) lithologies dissimilar to the Boundary Mountains terrane were accreted to its outboard margin penecontemporaneously. The docking of the Boundary Mountains terrane and the initiation of its peripheral melanges are equated to the Penobscottian disturbance.

• Research Organization: Syracuse Univ., NY (USA)
• OSTI ID: 6651962
• Report Number(s): CONF-8510489-
• Conference Information: Journal Name: Geol. Soc. Am., Abstr. Programs; (United States) Journal Volume: 17
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

58 GEOSCIENCES
580201* -- Geophysics-- Seismology & Tectonics-- (1980-1989)
580300 -- Mineralogy
Petrology
& Rock Mechanics-- (-1989)
AMPHIBOLITES
APPALACHIAN MOUNTAINS
CAMBRIAN PERIOD
CANADA
FEDERAL REGION I
GEOLOGIC AGES
GEOLOGIC FORMATIONS
GEOLOGIC HISTORY
GNEISSES
IGNEOUS ROCKS
MAINE
METAMORPHIC ROCKS
MINERALOGY
MOUNTAINS
NORTH AMERICA
ORDOVICIAN PERIOD
OROGENESIS
PALEOZOIC ERA
PLATE TECTONICS
QUEBEC
ROCKS
SCHISTS
TECTONICS
USA
VOLCANIC ROCKS