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The utilization of seismic interpretation to identify and describe the shallow subsurface structures in the southeastern Mediterranean Sea

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Abstract

The shallow subsurface structures of the offshore Nile Delta particularly in the southeastern Mediterranean were dealt through the interpretation of 40 two-dimensional seismic reflection lines. The interpretations of seismic reflection data indicated that the principle sedimentary processes affecting the study area include three main structural groups according to their origin and development. The first group of structures comprises of gravity-driven structures, which include slides, slumps, turbidities, and debris flow. Slides are present in three different forms on seismic sections: slide sheets, slides with scar, and wedges of slide materials. Slumps have many geometrical shapes: lenses, spoon-shaped slumps, and slumped blocks bound by growth faults. Debris flows are present as transparent unit (due to the dispersion of seismic waves at debris boundaries), whereas turbidities appear on the seismic profiles, which are formed of closely spaced parallel thin reflectors analogous to their thin stratified bedded layers. The second group of structures is syn-depositional structures, which include growth faults, and tilted and rotated fault blocks. Growth faults are listric in shape and usually dip seaward; displacements along the fault plane increase with depth. Some of these faults are incipient, and some are complicated and intersected by secondary antithetic faults. Most of the growth faults soles out basin wards and in the evaporites layer. Fault blocks are formed due to the Messinian evaporite movement vertically and horizontally due to its mobility as a consequence to the pressure resulted from the overloading of Pliocene sediment. The third group of structures comprises evaporite flow structures such as diapiric structures and graben collapse structures. The surface of the Messinian evaporites was folded during its flow as a consequence to the lateral compression acted on the mobile strata of the Messinian evaporites to form diapiric triangular structures and creates a stress zone faulting and fractures system. These conditions led to the formation of collapse structures or graben collapse structures.

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Acknowledgements

The authors are greatly indebted to the Egyptian General Petroleum Corporation (EGPC) for supplying the data to carry out this investigation for permission to publish this work. The authors would like to express their gradual thanks to Prof. Ahmed Sayed Ahmed Abu El Ata, professor of geophysics at Ain Shams University, for their benefit comments on our manuscript. The authors also appreciate the peer reviewers that will review our manuscript.

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  1. Geology Department, Faulty of Science, Damietta University, New Damietta, Egypt

    Mohamed Omran, El Sayed Selim & Hatem Aboelkhair

  2. Salman Bin Abdul Aziz University, Alkharj, Saudi Arabia

    Mohamed Omran

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Omran, M., Selim, E.S. & Aboelkhair, H. The utilization of seismic interpretation to identify and describe the shallow subsurface structures in the southeastern Mediterranean Sea. Arab J Geosci 6, 3749–3764 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12517-012-0639-x

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