Abstract: Processes Affecting Preservation Potential along the Central Texas Coast

FASSELL, MICHELLE, and JOHN ANDERSON
Rice University, Houston, TX

Preservation potential of shoreface sediments along the central Texas shelf is variable. From Matagorda Island to North Padre Island, 105 shore-aligned sediment cores were collected to understand the depositional processes controlling shoreface sedimentation along strike and dip. There is a high preservation potential of sandprone shoreface sediments deposited during the last glacial eustatic highstand. On the shelf, older preserved highstand sequences contain a similar sand-prone facies. The modern shoreface profiles exhibit low gradients, are currently prograding, and are in excess of 3 m thick. Comparison of older sand-prone highstand units on the shelf to the modern prograding shoreface indicate similar processes affecting the preservation potential and lithologic variability of coastal lithosomes. The key processes affecting the preservation and variability are sediment input, storm reworking, longshore current transport, and rates of transgression. Further research will constrain the along-strike distribution of sand-prone deposits in the modern shoreface to understand the variability observed in the sandy facies of older highstand sequences.

AAPG Search and Discovery Article #90932©1998 GCAGS/GCS-SEPM Meeting, Corpus Christi, Texas