Mesozoic the Innuitian orogeny, the Brooks Range, the Verkhoyansk and Cherskiy Ranges in Siberia, and the Khingan Mountains in Manchuria. This orogeny was related to the opening of the Arctic Ocean and subduction of the North China and Siberian cratons under the Pacific Ocean. In contrast, the era featured the dramatic rifting of the supercontinent Pangaea, which gradually split into a northern continent, Laurasia, and a southern continent, Gondwana. This created the passive continental margin that characterizes most of the Atlantic coastline (such as along the U.S. East Coast) today. By the end of the era, the continents had rifted into
Pangean megamonsoon solar insolation shifted toward the Southern Hemisphere. Air then traveled from Laurasia (region of high pressure), across the Tethys Ocean to Gondwana (region of low pressure). Moisture advection toward the Southern Hemisphere would have fueled heavy precipitation along the Gondwana coasts, while Laurasia remained very dry. There are marked similarities between factors contributing to the East Asian monsoon and those that would have influenced Pangean climate. This not only supports the theory that Pangean climate was dominated by the monsoon, but also aids in the study of it, providing paleoclimatologists with a present-day example to which they can compare their