Submarine lobes and feeder channels of redeposited, temperate carbonate and mixed siliciclastic‐carbonate platform deposits (Vera Basin, Almería, southern Spain)

Abstract

Temperate carbonates and mixed siliciclastics‐carbonates of Upper Tortonian age were deposited on a narrow platform along the southeastern margin of the Sierra de los Filabres on the western side of the Vera Basin. The temperate carbonates were unlithified or were only weakly lithified on the seafloor and so were easily prone to synsedimentary removal. Part of the shelf sediments were eroded, reworked and redeposited in submarine lobes, up to 40 m thick and 1 km wide. The lobes consist of turbiditic carbonates (calcarenites and calcirudites) and mixed siliciclastics‐carbonates, which contain up to 30% siliciclasts, derived from the Sierra de los Filabres to the northwest, and abundant bioclasts of coralline algae, bivalves and bryozoans. In the inner platform, the feeder channels of the lobes cross‐cut beach and shoal deposits, and are filled by strings of debris flow conglomerates (up to 3 m thick and a few metres wide). These channels presumably developed as the continuation of river courses entering the sea. Further towards the outer platform, they pass into large channels (up to several hundred metres wide and 20 m deep) steeply cutting into the horizontally bedded strata of the platform. Significant quantities of platform sediment were removed by erosion during their excavation. Once abandoned, they were filled by new platform sediments. Further towards the basin, the channels associated with the lobes exhibit lateral accretion and internal cut‐and‐fill structures, and are intercalated between hemipelagic deposits. The channel‐filling sediments are in this latter case coarse‐grained carbonates and mixed siliciclastics‐carbonates. Lobe development concentrated first at Cortijo Grande on the western side of the study area, and then to the east at Mojácar. This migration may relate to the uplift of the Sierra Cabrera, a major high occurring immediately to the south of the channel and lobe outcrops.

Late Cretaceous to Early Eocene Sedimentation in the Sinop–Boyabat Basin, North‐Central Turkey: A Deep‐Water Turbiditic System Evolving into Littoral Carbonate Platform

“…Calciturbiditic successions deposited by non-channelized and mainly low-density currents have been widely reported from the lower slope, base-of-slope and basin-plain environments related to shelf-edge carbonate platforms and ramps (e.g. Colacicchi & Baldanza, 1986;Mullins & Cook, 1986;Eberli, 1987;Hazlett & Warme, 1988;Tucker, 1990;Braga et al, 2001;Drzewiecki & Simó, 2002;Savary & Ferry, 2004). The origin of chert concretions was discussed by Bustillo & Ruiz-Ortiz (1987).…”

Mangarara Formation: Exhumed remnants of a middle Miocene, temperate carbonate, submarine channel‐fan system on the eastern margin of Taranaki Basin, New Zealand

“…The architectural elements of the carbonate channelised system described above are present in many siliciclastic systems (e.g., Spinelli & Field 2001;gardner et al 2003;Posamentier & kolla 2003;klaucke et al 2004;Ó Cofaigh et al 2006), as well as in some carbonate deep-water systems (e.g., Braga et al 2001;Vigorito et al 2005Vigorito et al , 2006Payros et al 2007). Subaqueous sediment gravity flows are responsible for the transport and deposition of sediment in deep-water settings.…”

“…2007). A few ancient examples of deep-water mass-emplaced temperate carbonate systems have been described from eastern Mediterranean localities (Braga et al 2001;Vigorito et al 2005;Puga-Bernabeu et al 2008), where submarine channels have cut temperate carbonate platforms at shallow depths, funnelling bioclastic shelf carbonate basinwards onto submarine fans.…”

Uppermost Tortonian to Quaternary depocentre migration related with segmentation of the strike-slip Palomares Fault Zone, Vera Basin (SE Spain)

“…[32]. The Azagador Member is a platform deposit constituted by bioclastic-carbonate and mixed siliciclastic-carbonate sediments with biotic associations typical of a temperate climatic setting [11]. Basinwards, the Azagador member passes laterally to basinal silts, siliciclastic silty sandstones and marls (Abad Member of the Turre Formation [32].…”

“…3) to continental clast-supported conglomerates, locally found between the Upper Tortonian Chozas marls and the Messinian Abad marls. To the northwest of the Vera Basin, above the Abad marls there are reefs and yellow marls with diatomites deposited during the highstand systems tract [2,11] prior to the Messinian salinity crisis that affected the Mediterranean [18]. -Unit VII (Latest Messinian to Pliocene) deposited after the Messinian salinity crisis event.…”