History and Evaluation of Ras Fanar Reefs Gulf of Suez – Egypt

By

Samy Serag Abd El Kader¹, Sayed Abd Allah Khaled¹

(1) Suez Oil Company (SUCO), Cairo, Egypt

Ras Fanar oil field is located on the offshore part of the western side of the Gulf of Suez, some 3.5 Km east of Ras Gharib shoreline. This field was discovered in 1978 by drilling well KK 84-1, it penetrated relatively thin post Miocene clastics, Miocene evaporites and found a thick sequence of oil bearing carbonate rock built-up; the pre-Miocene strata were uplifted, faulted and deeply eroded during Oligocene times. This strata were found below O.O.W.C. of Ras Fanar, hence its water bearing. Ras Fanar structure is an elongated horst block trending north west-south east and tilted to the north east, the structure is dissected by some Aquaba trending cross faults. In the present study we will talk about the reefs of Ras Fanar oil field, its type, its history, relationship with the Gulf of Suez tectonics and its approach to be an oil producer reservoir rock. The word reef has been used in many ways, it has been closely applied to (1) any limestone mass that swells into a reef like mound surrounded by sedimentary material of different kinds. (2) Other limestone that don’t have this form but contain the abundant fossilized remains or organisms. To make this distinction clear, two words were introduced, BIOHERM (Any limestone has a mound-shaped structure built by in-situ growth of skeleton-secreting sessile organism) and BIOSTROME (Other limestone mass has a sheetlike accumulation of skeletal debris).