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Response of Cenozoic turbidite system to tectonic activity and sea-level change off the Zambezi Delta

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Abstract

Submarine fans and turbidite systems are important and sensitive features located offshore from river deltas that archive tectonic events, regional climate, sea level variations and erosional process. Very little is known about the sedimentary structure of the 1800 km long and 400 km wide Mozambique Fan, which is fed by the Zambezi and spreads out into the Mozambique Channel. New multichannel seismic profiles in the Mozambique Basin reveal multiple feeder systems of the upper fan that have been active concurrently or consecutively since Late Cretaceous. We identify two buried, ancient turbidite systems off Mozambique in addition to the previously known Zambezi-Channel system and another hypothesized active system. The oldest part of the upper fan, located north of the present-day mouth of the Zambezi, was active from Late Cretaceous to Eocene times. Regional uplift caused an increased sediment flux that continued until Eocene times, allowing the fan to migrate southwards under the influence of bottom currents. Following the mid-Oligocene marine regression, the Beira High Channel-levee complex fed the Mozambique Fan from the southwest until Miocene times, reworking sediments from the shelf and continental slope into the distal abyssal fan. Since the Miocene, sediments have bypassed the shelf and upper fan region through the Zambezi Valley system directly into the Zambezi Channel. The morphology of the turbidite system off Mozambique is strongly linked to onshore tectonic events and the variations in sea level and sediment flux.

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Acknowledgements

We thank the French polar institute (IPEV) for the logistic and financial support and the captain and crew of Marion Dufresne II (IPEV) for their excellent work during the expedition. We are grateful to the contributions of Graeme Eagles, two anonymous reviewers and E. S. Mahanjane in improving the content and for the English corrections. All maps were created using GMT 5.0 (Wessel et al. 2013). GEBCO 2014: (Weatherall et al. 2015).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Alfred Wegener Institute, Hemholtz Centre for Polar und Marine Research (AWI), Am Alten Hafen 26, 27568, Bremerhaven, Germany

    Jude A. Castelino & Wilfried Jokat

  2. Bundesanstalt für Geowissenschaften und Rohstoffe (BGR), Stilleweg 2, 30655, Hanover, Germany

    Christian Reichert

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  1. Jude A. Castelino
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  2. Christian Reichert
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  3. Wilfried Jokat
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Correspondence to Jude A. Castelino.

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Castelino, J.A., Reichert, C. & Jokat, W. Response of Cenozoic turbidite system to tectonic activity and sea-level change off the Zambezi Delta. Mar Geophys Res 38, 209–226 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11001-017-9305-8

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