History of uplift of the crystalline basement of Sinai and its relation to opening of the Red Sea as revealed by fission track dating of apatites

Thirty fission track ages have been obtained for apatite concentrates from Precambrian crystalline basement rocks of the Sinai Peninsula. The principal results of the study indicate that: 1. (1)|Apatite fission track ages do not date times of petrogenesis. 2. (2)|Uplift of the basement amounted to at least 5 km and this amount probably equals or exceeds that in other areas bordering the Red Sea. 3. (3)|Uplift rates approximated 0.1-0.2 mm/yr. 4. (4)|The patter of apatite ages reveals non-uniform uplift between fault-bound blocks, with greater uplift parallel to the Gulf of Suez, an area of extensional tectonics, and less uplift parallel to the Gulf of Elat, an area dominated by strike slip movements. 5. (5)|Domal uplift commenced in Sinai about 26.6 ± 3 m.y. ago and continued for most of the Miocene with at least 3 km of uplift post-dating 9 m.y. ago. The relationships between geological events associated with rifting and spreading are established, and a time table for the different phases in the framework of the Red Sea rift system is proposed.