Australia: The Land Where Time Began

A biography of the Australian continent 

This basin was initiated by a north-west trending rifting characterised by steeply dipping normal faults during the Early Cretaceous. As Australia broke from Antarctica at the end of the Early Cretaceous with crustal extension within the Bass Basin. The resulting rotation of existing normal faults and the formation of north-south transform faults with wrench components. Following this there was some sagging of the basin with limited extension associated with the opening of the eastern coast of Australia. This event led to further rotation of earlier faults and the development of east-west transfer faults with associated wrenching. Basin sag resumed during the Late Cretaceous and Palaeocene

Sources & Further reading

Mary E White, After the Greening, The Browning of Australia, Kangaroo Press, 1994