Lower Cretaceous oolites from the Mid-Pacific Mountains (Resolution Guyot, Site 866)

Abstract

On Resolution Guyot two major intercalations of oolitic limestone have developed, one of latest Hauterivian-Barremian age, which rests directly on edifice basalt, and the second of Aptian age, which is sandwiched between lagoonal-peritidal carbonate sediments. Both oolite packages may be interpreted as the sedimentary response to an increase in the generation of accommodation space; in the first instance, probably related to high rates of basement subsidence, in the second, to a probable eustatic rise in sea level. The ooids vary in structure from micritic and featureless through micritic and concentrically laminated to radial and commonly show combinations of these fabrics. Radial cortical structures predominate. -from Authors