EstGroenland

North Iceland Offshore

On the Iceland geological setting, in which the Atlantic-type divergent margins sediments are omitted, it is important to recognize the Greenland–Iceland–Faroe Ridge Complex (known, often, by its GIFRC acronym), which seems to be present since the Paleocene, when the initial valley rift (spreading center) shift westward from the Rockall trough area to the present Mid-Oceanic ridge (see Page 12H). Along the GIFRC, several lateral jumps of the rift valleys axis and seamounts were recognized (A. Hjartarson et al., 2017) The different ages of rift valleys axis corroborate crustal accretion, i.e., the seafloor spreading through time. Seamounts. particularly, southward of ridge complex, seem to be younger than the surrounding ocean floor, suggesting a still active intra-plate volcanic zone.

This Canvas autotrace illustrates the post-breakup lava-flows, in which are, probably, include some pre-rifting rocks of the Jan Mayer microcontinent (fragment of the continental crust within the oceanic part of the western Eurasian plate separated from eastern Greenland margin during the Paleocene (± 55 Ma) at the the onset of separation between the Greenland and Eurasian plates), illustrated the stratigraphic column deposited, in this area, in association with the post Pangea continental encroachment stratigraphic cycle.