--> Abstract: Quantification of Slope Channel-Levees, the Rosario Formation, Baja California, Mexico; #90063 (2007)

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Quantification of Slope Channel-Levees, the Rosario Formation, Baja California, Mexico

 

Kane, Ian1, Ben Kneller2, Mason Dykstra3, William. D. McCaffrey1 (1) University of Leeds, Leeds, United Kingdom (2) University of Aberdeen, Aberdeen, United Kingdom (3) University of California, Santa Barbara, CA

 

As exploration pushes towards deeper water and increasingly complex reservoirs it becomes imperative to have detailed facies models. In the case of submarine channel-levees, an often ambiguous context coupled with poor preservation potential leads to a paucity of detailed outcrop studies. Here we document the ‘master bounding levees' of a large, coarse grained channel-levee complex within the Upper Cretaceous Rosario Formation of Baja California, Mexico. Levee facies consist of thinly interbedded non-amalgamated, sharp based sandstones and siltstones, often highly bioturbated, with variable palaeocurrents and often containing slide blocks and slumps. Tractional structures in channel-proximal levee facies consist of ripples, including climbing, and overturned ripples, and parallel lamination. Structureless sandstones are also common in channel-proximal localities. In channel-distal levee outcrops starved ripples are abundant. Levee sandstones thin according to a power-law, with standard deviation in thickness decreasing linearly. The levee crest is identified based upon moving averages of bed thickness, which show thinning upwards of inner- and thickening upwards of outer-levee deposits. These data are used to present a model for levee growth and migration of the crest. Additionally, spatial variation of grain size within the levee sandstones will be presented. The field data will be compared to modern, ancient, subsurface and experimental studies.

 

AAPG Search and Discover Article #90063©2007 AAPG Annual Convention, Long Beach, California