Plio‐Pleistocene tectonics and eustasy in the Gippsland Basin, southeast Australia: Evidence from magnetic imagery and marine geological data

Abstract

The Pliocene and Pleistocene sediments of the Gippsland shelf are dominated by mixed carbonates and siliciclastics. From a detailed stratigraphic study that combines conventional marine geology techniques with magnetic imagery, the Late Neogene tectonic and eustatic history can be interpreted and correlated to the onshore section. Stratigraphic analyses of eight oil and gasfield foundation bores drilled to 150 m below the seabed revealed three principal facies types: (i) Facies A is fine‐grained limestone and limey marl deeper than 50 m below the seabed, of Late Pliocene age (nannofossil zones CN11–12); (ii) Facies B is a fine‐coarse pebble quartz‐carbonate sand that occurs 10–50 m below the seabed in the inner shelf, grading down into Facies A in wells in the outer shelf, and is of Early‐Middle Pleistocene age (nannofossil subzones CN13a-14b: ca 1.95–0.26 Ma); and (iii) discontinuous horizons of Facies C composed of carbonate‐poor carbonaceous and micaceous fine quartz sand occurring 10–50 m below the seabed. The sparse benthic foraminifers in Facies C are inner shelf or Gippsland (euryhaline) Lakes forms. Holocene sands dominate the upper 1.5–2.5 m of the Gippsland shelf and disconformably overlie cemented limestones with aragonite dissolution, indicating previous exposure to meteoric water. Nannofossil dating of the limestones indicates ages within subzone CN14b (dated between ca 0.26 and 0.47 Ma). Airborne magnetic imaging across the Gippsland shelf and onshore provides details of buried magnetic palaeoriver channels and barrier systems. The river systems trend south‐southeast from the Snowy, Tambo, Mitchell, Avon, Macalister and Latrobe Rivers across the shelf. Sparker seismic surveys show the magnetic palaeochannels as seismic ‘smudges’ 20–40 m below the seabed. They appear to correspond to Facies C lenses (i.e. are Early to Middle Pleistocene features). Magnetic palaeobarrier systems trending south‐southwest in the inner shelf and onshore beneath the Gippsland Lakes are orientated 15° different to the modern Ninety Mile Beach barrier trend. Offshore, they correlate stratigraphically to progradation packages of Facies B. Analysis of bore data in the adjacent onshore Gippsland Lakes suggests that a Pliocene barrier sequence 100–120 m below surface is overlain by fluvial sand‐gravel and lacustrine mud facies. The ferruginous sandstone beds resemble offshore Facies C, and are located where magnetic palaeoriver channel systems occur, implying Early to Middle Pleistocene ages. Presence of the estuarine bivalve Anadara trapezia in the upper lacustrine mud facies suggests that the Gippsland Lakes/Ninety Mile Beach‐type barriers developed over the past 0.2 million years. Further inland, magnetic river channels that cut across present‐day uplifted structures, such as the Baragwanath Anticline, suggest that onshore Gippsland uplift continued into the Middle Pleistocene.