Sediment Transport over Complex Salt Topography: Fill and Spill Revisited

Explore the complexities of sediment transport over salt topography in this 51-minute lecture by Dr. Gillian Apps, Research Fellow at the Bureau of Economic Geology, The University of Texas at Austin. Delve into the challenges of fill & spill models in salt provinces and deepwater fold and thrust belts, where 3-dimensional structural topography and evolving spill points create a 4-dimensional problem for predicting facies associations. Examine a Pleistocene-age sequence in minibasins within a salt-detached foldbelt at the compressional toe of the Sigsbee salt canopy in the Northern Gulf of Mexico. Understand the spatial and temporal limitations of early sand-rich depositional sequences, the evolution of erosional and aggradational channel complexes, and their impact on drainage patterns. Learn how high sediment flux in active fairways leads to the dominance of major aggradational channel systems and associated MTCs in the Pleistocene stratigraphic record, often obscuring or eroding earlier, better-connected sand-rich reservoirs. Gain insights into the implications of these processes for reservoir quality and connectivity in complex salt topography environments.