The Pilbara Craton stabilises
A block of continental crust in Western Australia locks into place and never moves again.
- When
- Known to
- ± 40 million years
- Era
- Paleoarchean, Archean
The Pilbara becomes a stable craton — thick, buoyant, cold crust that resists being recycled. It carries the Dresser, Apex and Strelley Pool formations, which between them hold most of the world's earliest convincing evidence for life. Cratons like this are why any Archean record survives at all; everything outside them was subducted long ago.