Wikipedia article incorporates public domain material from this USGS article.
- The thick, layered lava flows of the CRBG erupted as flood basalts, which originate as some of the most highly effusive eruptions in the world. The CRBG sequence a classic example of flood basalt activity that erupted more than 350 lava flows from about 16.7 Ma to 5.5 Ma. The eruptions originated from a series of generally north-northwest-trending linear fissures, ranging from tens to hundreds of kilometers in length, located along the Washington/Oregon/Idaho border. The magma that fed these massive eruptions may have come from a plume-like upwelling from the mantle called a hot spot. Since the time of the CRBG eruptions, the North American plate has moved in a west-southwestwardly motion, and that hot spot is now believed to reside beneath Yellowstone volcano in northwest Wyoming.