Cambrian–Lower Ordovician of SW Quebec–NE New York

Abstract

The Ottawa aulacogen/graben on the NE US—Canadian (SW Quebec and eastern Ontario) border is a long ENE-trending structure formed with initial late Neo proterozoic rifting of the Rodinia supercontinent. This rifting formed the active spreading arms (New York Promontory and Quebec Reentrant) along the (presently) NE margin of the new Laurentia paleocontinent, with the Ottawa aulacogen commonly regarded as a failed arm of the rifting. However, no sediment accumulation in the aulacogen is recorded until the late early Cambrian subsidence of a SE- trending belt that includes the aulacogen and its extension, the Franklin Basin, in NW Vermont. Late early Cambrian marine onlap (Altona Formation) followed by more rapid late middle Cambrian subsidence and deposition of fluviatile arkoses (Covey Hill Formation of SW Quebec and Ausable Formation/Member of eastern New York) record rapid foundering of this “failed arm.” Subsequent deposition (latest middle Cambrian–Early Ordovician) in the Ottawa aulacogen produced a vertical succession of lithofacies that are fully comparable with those of the shelf of the New York Promontory. One of the greatest challenges in summarizing the geological history of the Ottawa aulacogen is the presence of a duplicate stratigraphic nomenclature with lithostratigraphic names changing as state and provincial borders are crossed.