Slide Mountain Ocean

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Plate tectonics of the Intermontane Islands arc 195 million years ago Intermontane arc.png
Plate tectonics of the Intermontane Islands arc 195 million years ago

The Slide Mountain Ocean was an ancient ocean that existed between the Intermontane Islands and North America [1] beginning around 245 million years ago in the Triassic period. It is named after the Slide Mountain Terrane, which is composed of rocks from the ancient oceanic floor. [1] There was a subduction zone on the Slide Mountain Ocean's floor called the Intermontane Trench where the Intermontane Plate was being subducted under North America. The floor of the Slide Mountain Ocean was pushed up onto the ancient margin of North America.

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Intermontane is a physiographic adjective formed from the prefix "inter-" and the adjective "montane".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Laramide orogeny</span> Period of mountain building in North America

The Laramide orogeny was a time period of mountain building in western North America, which started in the Late Cretaceous, 70 to 80 million years ago, and ended 35 to 55 million years ago. The exact duration and ages of beginning and end of the orogeny are in dispute. The Laramide orogeny occurred in a series of pulses, with quiescent phases intervening. The major feature that was created by this orogeny was deep-seated, thick-skinned deformation, with evidence of this orogeny found from Canada to northern Mexico, with the easternmost extent of the mountain-building represented by the Black Hills of South Dakota. The phenomenon is named for the Laramie Mountains of eastern Wyoming. The Laramide orogeny is sometimes confused with the Sevier orogeny, which partially overlapped in time and space.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Farallon Plate</span> Ancient oceanic plate that has mostly subducted under the North American Plate

The Farallon Plate was an ancient oceanic plate. It formed one of the three main plates of Panthalassa, alongside the Phoenix Plate and Izanagi Plate, which were connected by a triple junction. The Farallon Plate began subducting under the west coast of the North American Plate—then located in modern Utah—as Pangaea broke apart and after the formation of the Pacific Plate at the centre of the triple junction during the Early Jurassic. It is named for the Farallon Islands, which are located just west of San Francisco, California.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Koʻolau Range</span> A non-regular jagged mountain range in Oahu, Honolulu County, Hawaii, US

Koʻolau Range is a name given to the dormant fragmented remnant of the eastern or windward shield volcano of the Hawaiian island of Oʻahu. It was designated a National Natural Landmark in 1972.

Slide Mountain may refer to:

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Heart Mountain (Wyoming)</span>

Heart Mountain is an 8,123-foot klippe just north of Cody in the U.S. state of Wyoming, rising from the floor of the Bighorn Basin. The mountain is composed of limestone and dolomite of Ordovician through Mississippian age, but it rests on the Willwood Formation, rocks that are about 55 million years old—rock on the summit of Heart Mountain is thus almost 300 million years older than the rocks at the base. For over one hundred years, geologists have tried to understand how these older rocks came to rest on much younger strata.

The Intermontane Plate was an ancient oceanic tectonic plate that lay on the west coast of North America about 195 million years ago. The Intermontane Plate was surrounded by a chain of volcanic islands called the Intermontane Islands, which had been accumulating as a volcanic chain in the Pacific Ocean since the Triassic period, beginning around 245 million years ago. The volcanism records yet another subduction zone. Beneath the far edge of the Intermontane microplate, another plate called the Insular Plate was sinking. This arrangement with two parallel subduction zones is unusual. The modern Philippine Islands are located on the Philippine Mobile Belt, one of the few places on Earth where twin subduction zones exist today. Geologists call the ocean between the Intermontane islands and North America the Slide Mountain Ocean. The name comes from the Slide Mountain Terrane, a region made of rocks from the floor of the ancient ocean.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Intermontane Islands</span>

The Intermontane Islands were a giant chain of active volcanic islands somewhere in the Pacific Ocean during the Triassic time beginning around 245 million years ago. They were 600 to 800 miles (1,300 km) long and rode atop a microplate known as the Intermontane Plate. Over early Jurassic time the Intermontane Islands and the Pacific Northwest drew closer together as the continent moved west and the Intermontane Plate subducted. About 180 million years ago in the Mid-Jurassic time the last of the Intermontane Plate subducted and the Intermontane Islands collided with the Pacific Northwest, forming parts of British Columbia, Canada. The Intermontane Islands were too big to sink beneath the continent, and welded onto the continent, forming the Intermontane Belt. Geologists call the ocean that existed between the Intermontane Islands and North America the Slide Mountain Ocean.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bridge River Ocean</span> Ancient ocean between North America and the Insular Islands during the Mesozoic

The Bridge River Ocean was an ancient ocean that existed between North America and the Insular Islands during the Mesozoic era. Similar to the earlier Slide Mountain Ocean, the Bridge River Ocean had a subduction zone on the ocean floor called the Insular Trench. The closure of the Bridge River Ocean occurred about 115 million years ago, during the mid Cretaceous period.

The Intermontane Trench was an ancient oceanic trench during the Triassic. The trench was probably 600 to 800 miles long, parallel to the west coast of North America. The ocean that the trench was located in was called the Slide Mountain Ocean.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Geology of the Rocky Mountains</span> Discontinuous series of North American mountain ranges with distinct geological origin

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Insular Islands</span> Ancient North American volcanic island chain

The Insular Islands were an extended chain of volcanic islands forming an arc in what is now the Pacific Ocean during the Paleozoic and Mesozoic eras. The islands formed by subduction and melting of the Farallon Plate along a fragment upon which they rose called the Insular Plate. They were bounded by the Panthalassic Ocean to the west and the Bridge River Ocean to the east. They probably formed as a composite of several volcanic chains near the equator, offshore of continental landmasses, by the Carboniferous Period around 300-325 million years ago.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Intermontane Belt</span> Physiogeological region in the Pacific Northwest of North America

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Volcanism of Canada</span> Volcanic activity in Canada

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Insular Belt</span>

The Insular Belt is a physiogeological region on the north western North American coast. It consists of three major island groups and many smaller islands and stretches from southern British Columbia into Alaska and the Yukon. It represents the Late Cretaceous to Eocene accretion of what is known as the Insular Superterrane to the North American continent.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Geology of British Columbia</span>

The geology of British Columbia is a function of its location on the leading edge of the North American continent. The mountainous physiography and the diversity of rock types and ages hint at the complex geology, which is still undergoing revision despite a century of exploration and mapping.

This is a list of articles related to plate tectonics and tectonic plates.

The Slide Mountain Terrane is a late Paleozoic terrane made of a complex of oceanic rocks in northern and southern British Columbia, Canada. The rocks of the terrane include Carboniferous limestones, fine grained quartz rich clastics, conglomerates and volcanic rocks. Permian Kalso Group mafic volcanics are included. The Kalso Group volcanics originated from an ocean ridge environment adjacent to the Permian continental margin.

The geology of Yukon includes sections of ancient Precambrian Proterozoic rock from the western edge of the proto-North American continent Laurentia, with several different island arc terranes added through the Paleozoic, Mesozoic and Cenozoic, driving volcanism, pluton formation and sedimentation.

References

  1. 1 2 "The Omineca Episode (180-115 million years ago)". Burke Museum. Archived from the original on 10 August 2016. Retrieved 19 June 2016.