Intra-continental rifting inferred from the major late Carboniferous quartz-dolerite dyke swarm of NW Europe

Smythe, D.K. , Russell, M.J. and Skuce, A.G. (1995) Intra-continental rifting inferred from the major late Carboniferous quartz-dolerite dyke swarm of NW Europe. Scottish Journal of Geology, 31(2), pp. 151-162.

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Abstract

The late Carboniferous (Stephanian) quartz-dolerite dyke swarm of northern Britain extends eastwards from the Outer Hebrides on an arcuate trend for up to 200 km from the eastern UK coast, as far as the western margin of the Central Graben. The average trend of the swarm changes by about 45° between its western and eastern extremities. Individual dykes, which are generally up to 30 m wide onshore, attain widths of well over 1 km offshore. Magmatically and spatially, the swarm is closely related to the coeval Oslo Graben volcanic rocks and dykes of southern Norway, which lie on the extrapolation of the arcuate trend. The dyke trends point to a focus of relative tensile stress centred on the West Shetland Shelf region. Finite element modelling of the NW European area corroborates the stress-focusing hypothesis, which we interpret in the context of the major period of intra-continental rifting along the line of the proto North Atlantic (the Rockall Trough, Faeroe–Shetland Trough and eastern Norwegian Sea) at about 300 Ma. The regional distribution of Archaean and Caledonian lithosphere within Pangaea may account for the fact that both the dyke swarm and the Oslo Graben were located in northern Britain and southern Norway, rather than in the Faeroe–Shetland region.

Item Type:Articles
Status:Published
Refereed:Yes
Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID:Smythe, Professor David
Authors: Smythe, D.K., Russell, M.J., and Skuce, A.G.
College/School:College of Medical Veterinary and Life Sciences
Journal Name:Scottish Journal of Geology
Publisher:Geological Society Publishing House
ISSN:0036-9276
ISSN (Online):2041-4951

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