Learning Outcomes:
On completion of this field module, participants should be able to:
(1) Identify key depositional elements and stacking patterns across a range of terrestrial, paralic and deep-water depositional systems.
(2) Characterise and interpret the ductile and brittle structures developed in an evolving rift basin and in an evolving mountain belt.
(3) Appreciate the interplay of tectonic and climate controls on sequence, basin and mountain belt evolution.
(4) Link surface and subsurface datasets to predict 3D architecture.
(5) Characterise a base metal deposit and identify structural and lithological controls on its emplacement
(6) Draw on practical examples of how geomodelling can be used to address subsurface characterisation.
Indicative Module Content:
This module consists of 2 field-based courses. A two week field course in the Spanish south-central Pyrenees, an area where spectacular surface geology can be combined with subsurface seismic and borehole datasets. The course will involve a series of one and two-day exercises built around depositional architecture, stratigraphic prediction, structural analysis, tectonic-sedimentary interactions, fractured rock characterisation and geomodelling. The second course visits the Irish Orefield, a world-class Zn-Pb-Cu carbonate-hosted ore province, with several historic and active mines. This 3-day field-based course will unravel the structural evolution of the Irish Missisippian rift basin, the influence of this rifting on carbonate host rocks deposition, and the formation of Zn-Pb mineralisation in Lisheen and Abbeytown. Activities will include drillhole and outcrop based data collection and analysis in Ireland.