High-resolution seismic reflection profiling of neotectonic faults in Lake Timiskaming, Timiskaming Graben, Ontario-Quebec, Canada

Abstract

The Timiskaming Graben is a 400 km long, 50 km wide north-west trending morphotectonic depression within the Canadian Shield of eastern North America and experiences frequent intraplate earthquakes. The graben extends along the border of Ontario and Quebec, connecting southward with the Nipissing and Ottawa-Bonnechere grabens and the St. Lawrence Rift System which includes a similar structure underlying the Hudson Valley of the eastern USA. Together they form a complex failed rift system related to regional extension of North American crust during the breakup of Rodinia and, later, Pangea. The Timiskaming Graben lies within a belt of heightened seismic activity (Western Quebec Seismic Zone) with frequent moderate magnitude (greater than magnitude 5) earthquakes including a magnitude 6.2 in 1935. These events threaten aging urban infrastructure built on soft glacial sediments; post-glacial landslides along the Ottawa Valley suggest earthquakes as large as magnitude 7. The inner part of the Timiskaming Graben is filled by Lake Timiskaming, a large 110 km long post-glacial successor to glacial Lake Barlow that was ponded by the Laurentide Ice Sheet 9500 years ago. The effects of frequent ground shaking on lake floor sediments was assessed by collecting more than 1000 line kilometres of high-resolution ‘chirp’ seismic profiles. Late glacial Lake Barlow glaciolacustrine and overlying post-glacial sediments are extensively deformed by extensional faults that define prominent horsts and grabens; multibeam bathymetry data suggest that faults influence the morphology of the modern lake floor, despite high sedimentation rates, and indicate recent neotectonic deformation. The Lake Timiskaming area provides evidence of post-glacial intracratonic faulting related to recurring earthquake activity along a weak spot within the North American plate.