--> Abstract: Structural History of Pueblo Viejo Fault, Alto de Ceuta Field, Blocks II, III, IV and VIII, Lake Maracaibo, Venezuela, by R. A. Ripple, E. R. Gustason, E. Gomez, R. Y. Elphick, M. A. Vivas, M. F. Doe, M. Rampazzo, J. de Mena, and J. L. Mora; #90933 (1998).

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Abstract: Structural History of Pueblo Viejo Fault, Alto de Ceuta Field, Blocks II, III, IV and VIII, Lake Maracaibo, Venezuela

Ripple, R. A.; E. R. Gustason; E. Gomez; R. Y. Elphick; M. A. Vivas; M. F. Doe - GeoQuest; M. Rampazzo; J. de Mena and J. L. Mora - PDVSA

The Pueblo Viejo Fault is a major fault system located in the southeastern part of Lake Maracaibo, Venezuela. It trends for over 100 km in a north-south direction and has been periodically reactivated from the Jurassic through the Neogene. Originally expressed as a down-to-the-east normal fault in the Jurassic and Cretaceous, it underwent periods of sinistral transpression and partial inversion in the Tertiary. The Alto de Ceuta structure lies east of the Pueblo Viejo Fault and is approximately rhombohedral in plan. Major inversion and development of restraining bend structures at Alto de Ceuta occurred periodically throughout the Eocene and Miocene and resulted in the creation of a series of reverse-fault bounded anticlines at Alto de Ceuta. These anticlines trend northeast and evolve upsection into flower structures which culminate in a combination of normal and reverse faults in the Eocene section. A major erosional unconformity bounds the Eocene section, reflecting regional tilting and localized uplift during the Eocene and Oligocene. The Alto de Ceuta structure was created during this time. There is some evidence to suggest that uplift propagated from south to north in the Alto de Ceuta structure during this Eocene and Oligocene event. By Miocene time, the Pueblo Viejo Fault had inverted sufficiently to create a topographic high against which lower Miocene strata has thinned and been truncated. Inversion has continued to the present day with 750 feet of reversal observed in Miocene units along the Pueblo Viejo Fault.

AAPG Search and Discovery Article #90933©1998 ABGP/AAPG International Conference and Exhibition, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil