Abstract

A tectonically active ridge extends from Prince Patrick to Ellesmere Islands and separates the Sverdrup Basin from the Arctic Coastal Basin. Major tectonic movements on this ridge took place in Late Devonian, Permo-Pennsylvanian, Triassic, Jurassic and Cretaceous times.

Along the northwestern marginal ridge, Carboniferous sediments lie on marine clastics of Devonian-Silurian age which have been intensely deformed. The Carboniferous and Permian sections include thick platform carbonates which formed the northwestern sill to the salt and shale fill of the upper Paleozoic Sverdrup Basin.

Through Mesozoic time the Sverdrup Basin subsided more than the northwestern ridge. The Mesozoic clastic fill of the Sverdrup Basin prograded in a northerly direction and only in times of maximum regression did coarse clastics reach the northern margin. There is no evidence that any significant source of coarse clastics lay to the north.

The Arctic Coastal Basin is filled with sediments of Late Cretaceous to Tertiary age which overlie the Sverdrup Basin Mesozoic beds with pronounced angular unconformity along the northwestern marginal ridge.