Friday Field Photo #166: Thin-Bedded Turbidites

This week’s Friday Field Photo is from the Cretaceous Dorotea Formation in southern Chile. This particular outcrop includes a thick succession of thin-bedded sandstones we interpret to be sediment gravity flow deposits in a delta front environment. Check out our 2009 paper in Journal of Sedimentary Research for the details.

Measuring section (or logging core) through thin beds can be wonderful therapy or soul-crushing tedium, it really depends on your frame of mind at the moment. There are times where I absolutely love documenting sedimentary structures at the sub-centimeter level — and there are other times where I dread the task and would rather work through a stack of 2 meter-thick structureless sandstone beds.

Such is field work, and over time you learn to get yourself in the frame of mind necessary to get the work done. Tomorrow I begin the journey down to this area for several weeks of data collection and scouting/recon for future studies. We won’t be going to this particular outcrop, but we will undoubtedly come across some strata like this. I’m looking forward to it, it will be therapeutic.

I will try to post updates and photos while in the field, but it all depends on the wi-fi — sometimes it works well, sometimes it doesn’t, and sometimes there just isn’t any.