Irregular plate boundary controls on Foreland Basin sedimentation (Miocene, Kahramanmaraş Foreland Basin, SE Turkey)

Abstract

The northern movement of the Arabian Plate led to the development of a compressional regime in the south-eastern part of Turkey after the Late Cretaceous. The collision of the Arabian Plate with the Anatolide–Taurides Platform and subsequent development of the Kahramanmaraş Foreland Basin at the beginning of the Miocene evolved as a result of this movement. An irregular plate geometry or promontory of the Arabian Plate caused partitioning of the plate margin (precollision–collision–postcollision). This irregular plate boundary was delimited by western and northern boundary faults and an interior basin fault. The NW-oriented small wedge top basins on the overlying Anatolide–Taurides Platform obliquely cut through the foredeep basin. The region (across the wedge top basin) on the irregular promontory of the underlying Arabian Plate contains different sedimentation depocentres. Small fining-upward submarine fan deposits (including pebbly channel deposits and coarsening-upward lobe sequences) are located at the centre of the irregular part of the plate (in the Tanır region) and overlie planktic foraminifera-bearing claystones. These submarine fan sediments pass outboard into distal interbedded turbidite claystones and siltstones in a downdip direction (S-SE). The boundary fault intersection of the promontory led to the development of a submarine slope environment with irregular sea-floor topography in the Fırnız area (4–5km south-east of the Tanır region). The slump deposits, sandy debrites, and fine-grained thin-bedded turbidites filled this region. Structural alignments and seismicity associated with the plate margin were the main controlling factors on the geometry of the depocentre, sediment quantity, sediment input, sedimentary facies, local sea level changes, and post-sedimentary deformation in the Kahramanmaraş Foreland Basin.