Quantitative bathymetric analyses of selected deepwater siliciclastic margins: receiving basin configurations for deepwater fan systems

Controls on reservoir distribution, architecture and stratigraphic trapping in slope settings

“…Above-grade slopes with stepped profiles therefore characterize regions where sediment accumulation rates exceed rates of intraslope basin subsidence. Steffens et al (2003) demonstrate that salt-based above-grade slopes have significantly more volume of ponded accommodation (25% across the central GOM mid-slope) than lower mobility salt-based stepped profiles such as the Lower Congo Slope and shalebased stepped profiles such as where the amount of ponded accommodation is generally less than 2%.…”

“…As original defined by Prather et al (1998) and modified in Prather (2000) healed-slope accommodation was conceptual and based on a single 2D transect across the central Gulf of Mexico slope, offshore Louisiana. Healedslope accommodation now more rigorously defined in 3D by Steffens, Biegert, and Sumner (2003) is the space between the top of ponded accommodation and below a 3D convex hull fit to the rugose seafloor topography. Their analysis shows that healed-slope accommodation is more common and volumetrically greater than ponded accommodation on all slopes studied.…”

Paleo-bathymetric controls on the stratigraphic architecture and reservoir development of confined fans in the Auger Basin: central Gulf of Mexico slope

“…7, 9, and 11 also relate the eustatic cycles to the seismically defined depositional sequences. (Prather, 2003, Steffens et al, 2003 Beaubouef & Friedman (2000) describe this same type of space as the area occupied by perched slope fill.…”

Erosional sculpting of the Caprera confined deep-sea fan as a result of distal basin-spilling processes (eastern Sardinian margin, Tyrrhenian Sea)

“…The CDF therefore shares an evolution, governed by sedimentary processes that follow the filling of ponded accommodation, with the minibasin formed in other continental margins with topographically complex slopes (Beauboeuf and Friedmann, 2000;Demyttenaere et al, 2000;Booth et al, 2000;Prather, 2003;Steffens et al, 2003). In particular, the setting of the distal part of the CDF with multiple, downslope deepening erosional channels that connect into a single bypass trunk is similar to the Pleistocene intraslope basins of the Western Gulf of Mexico (Beauboeuf and Friedmann, 2000).…”