Sedimentological characteristics of continental sabkha, south Western Desert, Egypt
- PDF / 11,033,780 Bytes
- 19 Pages / 595.276 x 790.866 pts Page_size
- 113 Downloads / 198 Views
ORIGINAL PAPER
Sedimentological characteristics of continental sabkha, south Western Desert, Egypt Osama E. A. Attia & Hussien K. Hussien
Received: 29 September 2014 / Accepted: 9 February 2015 # Saudi Society for Geosciences 2015
Abstract Continental sabkha is recorded in the extreme middle part of the south Western Desert of Egypt representing one of the most promising areas for sustainable development, especially for agriculture. The geomorphologic units of the area are formed under the influence of structural, lithological, and/ or climatic controls. These units include pediplain, depressions, mass-wasted blocks, residual hills, drainage lines, and aeolian landforms. The effective deflation process is reinforced by the lack of protective vegetation cover and the susceptibility of weakly consolidated rocks to wind removal. Different rock units covering the area range in age from Early Cretaceous to Quaternary. Quaternary deposits include playa/ sabkha deposits where the continental sabkha is divided into four zones A, B, C, and D. Underground waters coming from the north and east were progressively enriched in solute by interaction with the surrounding sedimentary and igneous rocks. Most of the evaporite minerals grow displacively as a result of evaporative pumping. Mineralogically, the continental sabkha salt complex includes gypsum, natroalunite, tamarugite, bloedite, eugsterite, nitratine, halite, and D’ansite. Some of the major and trace elements (SiO2, Al2O3, Fe2O3, MgO, CaO, Na2O, K2O, as well as Rb, Ba, Zr, Sr, Y, V, and Zn) were measured. The correlation and enrichment of these
O. E. A. Attia Department of Geology and Geophysics, College of Science, King Saud University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia O. E. A. Attia (*) Department of Geology, Faculty of Science, Cairo University, Giza, Egypt e-mail: [email protected] H. K. Hussien Egyptian Nuclear Materials Authority (ENMA), Cairo, Egypt
major and trace elements indicate the origin of the salt complex in the sabkha. Keywords Continental sabkha . Evaporites . Sedimentology . Geochemistry
Introduction The studied continental sabkha covers an area of about 2, 500 km2 between long. 29° 30′ and 29° 50′ E and lat. 22° 10′ and 22° 30′ N (Fig. 1). It locates at the extremely middle part of the south Western Desert of Egypt and to the north of the Egyptian-Sudanese Boundary, SE of Bir Kuryum, and east of Bir Safsaf and G. Nusab El Balgoum (Fig. 1). The studied area characterized by many desert beauty sight seen of palm and dome trees and many scattered oases where the supply of underground water (spring or Bir) close to the surface (0.5 to 2 m in depth). The studied area represents one of the most promising areas for sustainable development especially for agriculture, where water is found in few places at Bir Nakhlai, Bir El-Shab, Bir Kuryum, Bir Kiseiba, Bir Abu El-Hussein, and Bir Murr. With the exception of Bir Murr, which is very brackish, most of the Birs (wells) are fresh and of good taste. The area is accessible through three main asphaltic roads (Fig. 1).
Data Loading...
