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The AAPG/Datapages Combined Publications Database

AAPG Bulletin

Abstract


Volume: 67 (1983)

Issue: 3. (March)

First Page: 471

Last Page: 471

Title: Storm Deposits (Tempestites) in Ordovician Cratonic Carbonates (Arbuckle Group, South-Central Oklahoma): ABSTRACT

Author(s): Robert K. Goldhammer, R. Douglas Elmore

Article Type: Meeting abstract

Abstract:

The Early Ordovician Kindblade Formation (Arbuckle Group), exposed in the Arbuckle Mountains of south-central Oklahoma, is a shallow marine epicontinental carbonate sequence that contains numerous storm deposits. Similar deposits also occur in other Arbukle Group units, although not as abundantly as in the Kindblade Formation. The storm deposits (tempestites) are of two types, proximal and distal; the latter dominates in terms of both number and aggregate thickness. Distal tempestites consist of a fining upward sequence, 5 to 50 cm (2 to 20 in.) thick, that overlies an eroded hardground or firmground. The sequence consists of a lag lithoclastic grainstone that grades up into a laminated peloidal grainstone and then into mudstone. Firmgrounds are characterized by hummocky, sharp, and erosional contacts (relief 2 to 7 cm, 0.75 to 2.75 in.) with grainstone-filled erosive pockets. Hardgrounds are characterized by sharp hummocky-to-convolute surfaces (relief < 4 cm, 1.5 in.), which are mineralized and bored. Primary sedimentary features such as laminations, burrows, and allochems are truncated at the surfaces, and borings are filled with unsorted lithoclasts. The lithoclasts at the base of the sequence are bored, generally well rounded, discoid in shape, and consist of mudstone, peloidal packstone, and oolitic grainstone. Infiltration fabrics within the lithoclastic grainstone include cement-filled shelter voids beneath large clasts and internal sediment perched on the upper surfaces of lithoclasts. The overlying peloidal grainstones contain ripple cross-la inations, plane-laminations, and hummocky cross-stratification as well as rare escape burrows. The overlying mudstone is sparsely fossiliferous and bioturbated with burrows either selectively dolomitized or infilled with lithoclastic grainstone. Although there are many examples of the ideal sequence described above, complex composite or amalgamated beds are also common.

Proximal tempestites consist of coarse lithoclastic flat pebble conglomerate beds approximately 1 m (3.25 ft) thick that are interbedded with ooid grainstone and overlie mudstone. The contact between the units is sharp and erosional. The lithoclasts are of variable composition and may be up to 20 cm (7.75 in.) in diameter.

The two types of tempestites occur in crude cycles, which consist of distal deposits overlain by proximal tempestites and ooid grainstones. The cycles are interpreted as shallowing-upward progradational sequences. The abundance of the storm deposits in the section, approximately one every 20 cm (7.75 in.), indicates that hundreds of storm-induced events are recorded in the Kindblade Formation. The tempestites represent rare catastrophic events, while the hardgrounds-firmgrounds are discontinuity surfaces that represent gaps in the sequence.

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