Sedimentological processes in a scarp-controlled rocky shoreline to upper continental slope environment, as revealed by unusual sedimentary features in the Neogene Coquimbo Formation, north-central Chile

Abstract

Exceptionally good outcrops of Miocene to Pliocene deposits in the vicinity of submarine Paleozoic basement scarps at Carrizalillo, north of La Serena, reveal a wealth of sedimentary features not commonly observed. The most proximal facies consist of rock fall and coarse-grained debris flow deposits directly abutting the basement wall from which they originated. Angular basement clasts are mixed with well-rounded cobbles, which probably formed as a basal gravel on a wave-cut platform at the beginning of marine flooding, subsequently accumulated at the scarp edge and were incorporated into the debris when the latter collapsed. The poor sorting, inverse grading, and protruding cobbles and boulders are classical debris flow features, with good clast imbrication indicating a laminar shearing action. A medial facies is represented by secondary channels running parallel to the major scarp about 1 km downslope of the first locality. In the largest channel, megaflutes at the base indicate the passage of highly turbulent, nondepositing flows eroding the soft, silty substrate. In the deepest, central part of the channel, a pebbly coquina shows horizontal and trough cross-stratification, with most of the bivalves oriented convex side up. Meter-scale rip-up clasts of the underlying siltstone are also present, indicating turbulent flow with a density sufficiently high to retard settling. The coquina is interpreted as a detachment deposit resulting from a hydroplaning debris flow along the central part of the channel, where the velocity and rate of pore pressure decay were highest. This deposit is overlain by fining upward, massive to horizontally stratified sandstone very similar in texture and composition to the matrix of the debris flow, suggesting its formation by surface transformation and elutriation of the latter. Along the channel margin, a basal centimeter-scale sandstone layer is virtually unaffected by the megaflute topography and clearly represents a subsequent event. It is interpreted as a basal shear carpet driven by the overlying debris flow. Within the shear carpet, a basal friction zone and an overlying collision zone containing a higher concentration of shell hash can be distinguished. The overlying debris flow deposit is represented by massive coquina with scattered, angular to rounded basement clasts. It contains disarticulated bivalves oriented with their concave side up, indicating large-scale upward fluid escape during deposition. A smaller secondary channel shows large rip-up rafts of the underlying substrate. Some rafts appear to have been plucked from the substrate by a process of sand injection from an overriding high-density sandy debris flow, which probably originated during a tsunami. Such clasts can climb upward into a laminar flow by down-current tilting and tumbling. The most distal facies occurs below a second scarp oriented more or less parallel to the present coastline, where finer-grained turbidites onlap and backlap onto the stoss and lee sides of an obstacle formed by eroded boulder conglomerates. The onlap deposits resemble inclined sandy macroforms recently described in submarine canyon settings. They are interbedded with diatom-containing, volcanic ash beds with cross-stratification dipping eastwards and containing deepwater microflora typical of continental upwelling zones.