PROBABLE CRETACEOUS-TO-RECENT RIFTING IN THE GULF OF MEXICO BASIN An answer to Callovian salt deformation and distribution problems? Part 1

Abstract

Abundant evidence from the Northern Gulf of Mexico Basin suggests that late Early Cretaceous to Recent sea-floor spreading is the principal factor in the formation of the structural components of this basin. This would classify the Gulf of Mexico Basin as an active tectonic basin as opposed to the more accepted passive basin status. The following two-part paper presents a model for this lithospheric plate adjustment together with the geological evidence to support this movement. Part I discusses the rift model and supporting evidence. Some of this evidence is: a proposed triple junction rift zone radiating from a large dome centered in the DeSoto Canyon area; the division of the Gulf of Mexico Basin Jurassic salt province into three salt basins (the Interior Exterior and Challenger Basins); the linearity and structurally-positive attitude of the Cretaceous Shelf Edge; an excessive Exterior Basin salt mass that thickens towards the Sigsbee escarpment; large areas of non-diapiric salt found within the Exterior Basin; an extensional fault zone found underlying the Abyssal Plain; and the absence of a Late Mesosoic section from the Exterior Basin a section that would be needed to cover the salt until it was overlain by younger Tertiary sediments.