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Geologic History of Virginia Go directly to model Introduction
to Rifting Models In the past 600 million years the eastern
seaboard of North America has experienced two rifting events;
that is, the opening of two ocean basins: the Proto-Atlantic
(Stage C) and the Atlantic (Stage L). Prior to this there were
probably other rifting events. Virginia and the Mid-Atlantic
region has a good record of these riftings, even if they are
fragmentary and sometimes masked by later events. Discovering
and unraveling major geologic events requires having a
theoretical model of how these events occur, and the kinds of
rocks and structures they generate, so that we will recognize
the evidence for what it is when we see it, even if it is
fragmentary and masked. Modern models of rifting events are
based on a wide diversity of information, from geophysical, to
evidence of modern events, to evidence of ancient