ABSTRACT

The discovery during recent years of several oil fields in southern Alabama and Florida has focused attention on the oil and gas possibilities of the Eastern Gulf Coastal Plain. This area of slightly more than 100,000 square miles comprises all of Florida and the southern counties of Alabama and Georgia. The region is underlain by Tertiary to Paleozoic rocks which reach a possible total thickness of more than 25,000 feet near the Gulf shore. The regional structure, part of the Gulf Coast geosyncline, is a gulfward-dipping homocline interrupted by local structures, the most prominent of which are the Hatchetigbee anticline, Jackson fault, Wiggins and Decatur arches, and South Florida embayment.

Search for oil in the region started near the turn of the century, but activity was sporadic until discovery of oil in southern Mississippi in 1939. More than 500 wells have been drilled, resulting in the discovery of four Upper Cretaceous oil fields in Alabama and one Lower Cretaceous field in Florida.

The present production in Upper and Lower Cretaceous beds and oil and gas shows in Jurassic and downdip Tertiary units suggests future reserves may be found rather widely distributed in the section.

The presence of 15 exploratory crews, including core drill, seismic, and gravity parties, and current leases totaling more than 14 million acres are concrete evidence of the oil industry's continuing faith in oil and gas possibilities of the region.

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