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The AAPG/Datapages Combined Publications Database

AAPG Bulletin

Abstract


Volume: 69 (1985)

Issue: 2. (February)

First Page: 282

Last Page: 282

Title: Valencia Fan (Northwestern Mediterranean): Channelized Distal Deposition Fan Variant: ABSTRACT

Author(s): A. Maldonado, H. Got, A. Monaco, S. O'Connell, L. Mirabile

Article Type: Meeting abstract

Abstract:

The Valencia Fan, a large deep-sea depositional system in the western Mediterranean Sea, developed in the structural depression between the Valencia Trough and the Balearic Basin Plain. Six main lithoseismic units are identified from 6,000 km of sparker profiles. Channelized and irregularly stratified units predominate. It is inferred that the sedimentary processes controlling the development of these units include channelized sediment flows that evolve downfan into sheet flows. Three fan depositional provinces are differentiated on the basis of the relative proportions of lithoseismic units and the inferred sedimentary processes.

Regularly stratified seismic units predominate in the non-fan environments. These units are dominated by fine-grained deposits resulting from hemipelagic settling and overbank flows from turbidity currents. Distal flows from the continental slopes of the Iberian Peninsula and Balearic Islands also contribute sediment for the development of these environments. The wavy units flanking the upper fan probably resulted from migrating sediment waves, whereas transparent units are attributed to extensive mass flow. The Valencia Valley is largely an erosional feature across which sediments from several source areas bypassed to the distal, deep-sea depositional system of the Valencia Fan. Deposition begins at the mouth of the valley where it is constricted by a volcano and beyond which there i a break in slope.

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