Kanimblan Orogeny Kanimblan Orogeny The Kanimblan orogeny was a mountain-building event in eastern Australia toward the end of Early Carboniferous time (about 318 million years ago). It was a terminal orogenic episode forming the Lachlan Fold Belt, which was also known as the Lachlan Geosyncline before the advent of the plate tectonics theory. Uplift and deformation occurred in a 1,000 km belt extending from Tasmania to Cape York. However the original width was 2,000 to 3,000 km wide, with the excess size absorbed by folding and thrust faulting. The Kanimblan orogeny also affected the Tasman Geosyncline, which is aligned parallel with the
Andean orogeny of the supercontinent Rodinia in the Neoproterozoic. The Paleozoic Pampean, Famatinian and Gondwanan orogenies are the immediate precursors to the later Andean orogeny. The first phases of Andean orogeny in the Jurassic and Early Cretaceous were characterized by extensional tectonics, rifting, the development of back-arc basins and the emplacement of large batholiths. This development is presumed to have been linked to the subduction of cold oceanic lithosphere. During the mid to Late Cretaceous (ca. 90 million years ago) the Andean orogeny changed significantly in character. Warmer and younger oceanic lithosphere is believed to have started to be subducted beneath South