Abstract: Regional Seismic Evaluation of Basement Control on Paleozoic Sedimentation in Ohio and West Virginia

Jovita B. Dominic, Thomas H. Wilson

Paleozoic sediments of the central Appalachian lie upon a complexly deformed basement that continued to deform during the Paleozoic. In West Virginia basement is cut by an aulocogen know as the Rome trough. Seismic data reveal that the Rome Trough is an asymmetrical graben with a faulted eastern margin, and generally rotational western margin. Differential subsidence across the western margin decreases exponentially following the early Cambrian inception of the Trough. Displacement of the East Margin fault appears coupled to west-flank rotation. Minor inversion of Trough structures is also observed following the initial phase of rapid subsidence. Inversion influences local sedimentation patterns and results in minor structures that may influence hydrocarbon distribution.

Regional seismic evaluation has been extended further west into Ohio to define regional scale subsidence history and local structural reactivation. Three seismic lines have been analyzed in Ohio that extend northwest from West Virginia to the Ohio COCORP line. Seismic expressions of the basement is marked by a relatively coherent reflection event. The basement faults in the distal part have smaller offsets and therefore less influence on the sedimentary features. This analysis evaluates the structural affects of Coshocton zone, Cambridge Arch and Burning Spring anticline on the depositional history of Paleozoic sedimentation in Ohio.

AAPG Search and Discovery Article #90954©1995 AAPG Eastern Section, Schenectady, New York