STRUCTURE SECTIONS ACROSS PARRY ISLANDS FOLD BELT AND VESEY HAMILTON

SALT WALL, ARCTIC ARCHIPELAGO, CANADA

F.G. Fox
Panarctic Oils

INTRODUCTION
In the western part of the Arctic Archipelago of Canada two structural provinces are dominant.
They are the Ellesmerian Orogenic Province and the Sverdrup Basin. The Ellesmerian Orogenic
Province extends in a great arc from northeastern Ellesmere Island to eastern Prince Patrick Island.
That part of it that lies on Bathurst and Melville islands, west of the Cornwallis Fold Belt, includes
the Parry Islands Fold Belt, which is typified by the structures of Bathurst and Central Melville
islands.
The western sector of the Sverdrup basin lies north of the Parry Islands Fold Belt. Its axis strikes
southwest and its southern erosional margin is the northern limit of exposure of the Parry Islands
folds. The illustrations that follow show typical Parry Islands fold structures, and a major diapiric
structure of the Sverdrup Basin.

PARRY ISLANDS FOLD BELT

The Parry Islands fold belt has a known length of about 565 to 600 km (350 to 375 mi). Its
width as seen on Bathurst Island is about 175 km (120 mi), and on central Melville Island is about
150 km (90 mi). The full width is not known because its northern margin is hidden beneath the
rocks of the Sverdrup Basin; it probably does not extend far beneath the basin.
The known stratigraphic succession ranges in age from Early Ordovician to Late Devonian
(Figure 2). It is believed that there are also Cambrian and Proterozoic sedimentary rocks, but
nothing is known of their sedimentary facies or thicknesses. In southern Melville Island the
Paleozoic and Proterozoic sedimentary section appears to be at least 10,000 m (33,000 ft) thick, as
concluded from seismic reflection data.
The Cambrian through Late Devonian beds are the southern basinal rocks of the Franklinian
Miogeosyncline. These fall readily into two megasequences the Lower Ordovician to Middle
Devonian consists of units of limestone, dolomite, shale, halite, and anhydrite, and the late Middle
through Upper Devonian sequence consists of a great thickness (as much as 4,500 m; 14,750 ft) of
shale, siltstone, and sandstone.
The response of these beds, primarily by folding, to southerly directed orogenic pressure
produced the Parry Islands Fold Belt. Two parts of the succession played a vital role in determining
the style and intensity of folding from place to place. The Bay Fiord salt served as a decollement
zone, a mobile substratum, above which folding proceeded. In areas where there is no Bay Fiord
salt the Ellesmerian Orogeny produced structures very different from the typical Parry Islands folds.
An important role also was played by the Late Ordovician to Middle Devonian facies. In areas
where that interval comprises limestone and dolomite of the Blue Fiord, Read Bay, and Allen Bay
formations, the orogeny produced broad, relatively short, rather unsystematic folds. Where the

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interval comprises the Eids and Cape Phillips shales, with the Bay Fiord salt at depth, the folds
erected are the typical Parry Islands type.
Thus the Ellesmerian Orogeny produced two distinct styles of deformation. In areas such as
southwest Melville Island, where the section contains thick carbonate sequences, the folds may
have wave lengths of 40 km (25 mi) or more and amplitudes as great as 5,000 m (16,000 ft). In
areas where the post-salt succession consists mainly of shale, the folds commonly are 100 km (60
mi) or more long, with average wave length of 12 km (7 mi) and amplitudes of 3,000 m (10,000 ft)
or less; such structures characterize central and eastern Melville Island and most of Bathurst Island.
Figure 1 shows the trace of a composite seismic reflection profile across central Melville Island.
It is 235 km (146 mi) long. Figures 3 and 4 are uninterpreted and interpreted versions of that
section, and Figure 5 is a conversion to geological terms of what the seismic sections show.
At the southwest end of the section, beneath Dundas Peninsula, the Lower and Middle Devonian
Eids shale retains its identity, but the underlying Cape Phillips shale passes southward, rather
abruptly, to Read Bay/Allen Bay limestone and dolomite. Moreover, the Bay Fiord evaporites grade
abruptly southward to carbonate rocks. Near the northeast end of the section, about 10 to 12 km (6
to 8 mi) southwest of King Point anticline, the Eids shale passes laterally northward to Blue Fiord
limestone, and the Cape Phillips shale grades northward into Read Bay/Allen Bay limestone and
dolomite.
The characteristics particularly well illustrated by this section are:
1) the increasing intensity of deformation from Dundas Peninsula northeast to King Point and beyond;
2) the lack of consistency in the dip azimuths of the thrust faults;
3) the seeming failure of the thrust faults to penetrate upward through the Cape de Bray and
Weatherall fine grained clastic succession; (This failure may be more apparent than real. Dips in the
axial zone of such folds as Beverley Inlet and King Point anticlines are commonly in the 50 to 600
range, and at Beverley Inlet drilling revealed high angle reverse faulting in the Weatherall beds.)
4) the presence of prodeltaic clinoform beds in the central sector of the section and their absence
from the Dundas and King Point areas, which are Ordovician to Middle Devonian carbonate
domains; (Clinoform beds are known in the Weatherall and Cape de Bray formations, but they are
present only in areas where the Ordovician to Middle Devonian interval is represented by shale.)
5) the detachment of the folds above the base of the Bay Fiord salt; and,6) the base of the salt
rises beneath the anticlines. (Those apparent flexures probably are to some degree spurious, created
by velocity pull-up. The velocity of the sediments, at least up to the top of the Weatherall
formation, probably is not much less than that of the salt. Therefore, on the geological section the
apparent folding at the base of the salt has been subdued, but not eliminated.)Broad low amplitude
folds, striking generally west, can be mapped at the base of the salt throughout the Parry Islands
fold belt. The mild deformation of the pre-salt bed is disharmonic relative to the Parry Islands folds.

Detached Sediments / Decollement Tectonics (A-Subduction)

SVERDRUP BASIN
The Sverdrup Basin lies north and west of the visible part of the Ellesmerian Orogenic Province.
It is about 1,300 km (800 mi) long, and in its central part is as much as 400 km (250 mi) wide. The
axial strike of its northeastern half is about N45E, and of its southwestern half the strike is about
N60E. In its depocenter, it is believed to contain about 12,000 m (39,000 ft) of Carboniferous,
Permian, and Mesozoic sediments (Balkwill and Fox, in press), comprising 5,000 m (16,000 ft) of
Carboniferous and Permian shales and evaporites and 7,000 m (23,000 ft) of Mesozoic shales and
sandstones.
Vesey Hamilton salt wall is in the southwestern sector of the basin (Figure 6). Upper Paleozoic
and Mesozoic sediments in this area are probably about 10,000 m (32,000 ft) thick, and consist of
about 5,000 m (16,000 ft) of Carboniferous and Permian siltstone, shale, and evaporites, and 5,000
m (16,000 ft) of Mesozoic sandstone and shale. The Bjorne formation, at the base of the Mesozoic
succession, comprises about 1,800 m (5,900 ft) of sandstone with minor shale. Figure 7 illustrates
the bulk of the stratigraphic succession above the Bjorne.
The salt wall is in an area of numerous diapirs, two of which are onshore on northern Sabine
Peninsula. All the diapirs shown on Figure 6 are piercement structures that reach the surface
onshore, and the sea bottom offshore. There are other structures in the area that are probably the
result of stunted diapirism; halokinesis was sufficient to create these structures, but was not
sustained or powerful enough to enable the salt to pierce the entire section and reach the surface.
The Vesey Hamilton salt wall is the most spectacular of the diapirs. It is illustrated in cross
section by a SE-NW directed seismic line that crosses the middle sector of the wall (Figures 8, 9,
and 10). It strikes at N35E and is 50 km (30 mi) long with an average width of 8 km (5 mi). This
enormous mass of salt rose from the early Pennsylvanian Otto Fiord formation. Structurally and
stratigraphically the picture demonstrated by Figures 8, 9, and 10 is a simple one, except in the
immediate vicinity of the wall. The length of this section is about 38 km (24 mi) and the effects of
the diapirism extend across about 18 to 20 km (11 to 12 mi). The shooting was done offshore and
recorded on the sea ice.
The effects of the diapirism are best observed on its southeast flank. There, pronounced thinning
of the top Bjorne to top Pollux sandstone interval indicates Early through Middle Triassic uplift.
overstepping near the diapir is clearly visible in the interval between the top of the second Schei
Point limestone and the top of the Pollux sandstone. Moreover, the top Pollux to top Borden Island
sandstone interval is reduced, and also shows structural overstepping. All the intervals to the base of
the Valanginian shale show distinctly reduced thicknesses as the salt wall is approached.
The near-diapir stratigraphic relationships at the base of the Valaginian shale are clearly
revealed. The beds below that shale, near the diapir, can be seen to be truncated, indicating that a
local unconformity is present. Moreover, above that unconformity, younger beds can be seen to

3.4.1-54

overstep.
Even in beds below the top of the Bjorne formation local thinning toward the salt wall is
apparent. It follows, then, that diapirism began in Early Triassic time, and continued in an episodic
way. During some intervals it merely resulted in stratigraphic attenuation over the crest. During
other times it was sufficient to expose the crest to erosion for brief intervals, resulting in truncation
of beds over the crest. Such strong pulses of halokinesis were followed by intervals of quiescence,
during which sediments were again deposited over the crest, overstepping the immediately
underlying beds. This process, begun during Early Triassic time, was repeated in Middle Triassic,
Early and Middle Jurassic, and Early Cretaceous time.
The record of uplift cannot be perceived beyond late Early Cretaceous time, at least in this area.
There are no detailed data relating to the post-Christopher (Cenomanian to Maestrichtian) rocks in
this part of the Sverdrup Basin.

A PARADOX
A scrutiny of the record sections (Figures 3, 4, 8, and 9) might lead the observer to conclude
that they display two vastly different styles of structure, which is true, and that they have nothing in
common, which is not true. Different in style they surely are. Nevertheless they have a common
factor that controlled the development of both kinds of structure. That factor is salt; Ordovician in
the Parry Islands Fold Belt, and Early Carboniferous (Pennsylvanian) in the Sverdrup Basin.
Without salt the Parry Islands folds certainly would lack the conformation that they have, and the
Vesey Hamilton Salt Wall would not exist. The real paradox lies in the fact that both kinds of
structure require compression, although not to an equal degree. The Parry Islands folds resulted
from Ellesmerian compressive stress acting horizontally from north to south. The salt wall and its
neighboring diapirs resulted from vertical compression of the salt, aided by its natural buoyancy, the
pressure being supplied, in a dilational stress field, by the sedimentary overburden bearing down on
the mobile salt.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The author is grateful for suggestions from D.C. Waylett and G.R. Varney of Panarctic Oils, and
for permission from Panarctic and A.I.E.G. et al partners to publish the salt wall seismic profile.

REFERENCES
Balkwell,H.R.,1978,Evolution of Sverdrup Basin, Arctic Canada:AAPG Bull., v. 62, p. 1004-1028.
Balkwell, H.R., \and F.G. Fox, in press, Incipient rift zone, western Sverdrup Basin, Arctic Canada,
in A.F. Embry, ed., Proceedings, Third International Symposium on Arctic Geology: Canadian
Soc. Petroleum Geols., Mem. 8.
Davies, G.R., 1975, Hoodoo L-41; diapiric halite facies of the Otto Fiord Formation in the Sverdrup
Basin, Arctic Archipelago: Geol. Survey Canada, Paper 75-1, pt. C, p. 273-278.
Kerr, J.W., 1974, Geology of the Bathurst Island Group and Byam Martin Island, Arctic Canada:
Geol. Survey Canada, Mem. 378.
Sweeney, J.F., 1977, Subsidence of the Sverdrup Basin, Canadian Arctic Islands: Geol. Soc.
America Bull., v. 88, p. 41-48.
Tozer, E.T., and R. Thorsteinsson, 1964, Western Queen Elizabeth Islands, Arctic Archipelago:
Geol. Survey Canada, Mem. 332.
Trettin, H.P. (coordinator), 1972, The innuitian province, in R.A. Price and R.J.W. Douglas, eds.,
Variations in tectonic styles in Canada: Geol. Assoc. Canada, Spec. Paper No. 11, p. 83-179.

Fox

Index map.

Detached Sediments / Decollement Tectonics (A-Subduction)

3.4.1-55