ABSTRACT: A Case of Drowning--The Death of a Carbonate Platform in the South China Sea

HOLLAND, DAVID C., JEFFREY S. DICKENS, and ANDREW D. HORBURY, BP Exploration, Uxbridge, Middlesex, United Kingdom

The Da Nang carbonate platform in the South China Sea, offshore Vietnam, exhibits the characteristics of a terminal drowning event at a variety of data scales. The poster exhibits the seismic, well log, sedimentological, and biostratigraphic evidence for this interpretation.

Seismic data clearly show the backstepping evolution of the platform at a large scale. Tying logs to the seismic data shows that the drowning sequence exhibits log characteristics typical of such an event. The evolution of the drowning event is preserved in great detail in the change in environmental stress suffered by the resident faunal assemblage, changes in rates of sedimentation and facies, and in the cementation history. Biostratigraphic data indicate slightly different ages of platform termination at different locations.

Although exposure surfaces are recognized within the carbonate, the transition from relatively shallow water carbonate to deeper water carbonates, and final covering by deep water clastic sediments, can be shown to occur without surface exposure.

AAPG Search and Discovery Article #91015©1992 AAPG International Conference, Sydney, N.S.W., Australia, August 2-5, 1992 (2009)