Trans-Atlantic correlation of the Palaeogene volcanic successions in the Faeroe Islands and East Greenland

Before continental break-up in the NE Atlantic, the Faeroe Islands and cent ral East Greenland were within a distance of 100-120 km. Chemical and litho logical data for complete sections through the 5 km thick piles of contempo raneous Palaeogene flood basalts in the Faeroe Islands and in the Nansen Fj ord area in East Greenland show very similar basalt compositions and evolut ion patterns with time. The Faeroes lower basalt formation and the equivale nt Nansen Fjord Formation in East Greenland form a pre-break-up succession overlain by a sediment horizon. A syn-break-up succession consists of the F aeroes middle and upper basalt formations and the equivalent Milne Land For mation in East Greenland in which five intervals can be correlated with a c ompositional evolution from Ti-rich magnesian basalts and picrites at the b ase to a dominance of MORE-like low-Ti basalts at the top. The successions were generated in the same mantle melting column beneath a thinning contine nt with a rift zone that eventually ruptured the continent. The evolution p attern is very similar to that seen on the SE Greenland margin, but spreadi ng according to the Palmason model of 1973 was not yet established. The pre - and syn-break-up successions formed volcanic megasystems stretching acros s the rift zone with areal extents of 70 000 and 220 000 km(2) and volumes of 120 000 and 250 000 km(3). Rocks from the pre- and syn-break-up successi ons can be discriminated based on a simple major-element plot. The overlyin g succession was 3-3.5 km thick in E Greenland but was thin or absent in th e Faeroes; the energy source for the melting appears to have been concentra ted on the Greenland side.