Bahariya-Formation

The Bahariya Formation ( also Baharija, Bahariyya or Bahriya Formation) is a fossiliferous strata association which was deposited during the Cenomaniums in northern Egypt. It was first described in 1914 by Ernst Stromer von Reichenbach, who had even called Baharije - level scientific.

Type locality of this formation is the Bahariyya Valley, in which it is manifest days - here it forms the floor and the deeper sections of the steep border. Your profile type is located at Gebel ed Dist. The Bahariya Formation is very widely distributed, they can be found (among other names ) still in the Sinai and even in Israel.

In the northeastern part of the valley iron ore is mined ( finds at Gebel Ghorabi, area around El Harra and El Gedida ). Recently, she has also won a petroleum reservoir rock to international interest.

Geological Background

The deposition of the Bahariya Formation ranged from about 97 Ma BP over a period of 3 to 6 million years ago and fell in the time of the then prevailing global sea level maximum, which reached 150 meters above today's sea level. The Cenomanian transgression of Tehthysmeeres took place in Egypt in the southern direction, much of the tectonically troubled ( with grave fractures in the Jurassic ) and the remaining passive continental margin of the Arabo - Nubian craton were flooded while successively. However, the sea level rise was very slow.

Stratigraphy and facies

The thickness of the Bahariya Formation is on the passive continental margin of 100-200 meters - at the type locality, it has 90 -100 meters on. However, in tectonically active shelf troubled area further north their thickness can be up to 400 - 500 yards grow.

The formation is usually divided into three layer links ( top of slope end ):

El heating Member - lagoonal to supratidale sequence with dark ferruginous sandstones - withdrawal of the Cenomanian sea
Gebel Dist Member - estuarine sequence with obliquely stratified sandstones
Gebel Ghorabi Member - fluvial sand and siltstone

Note: Some authors separate the El heating member also on the Bahariya Formation and consider it as a separate formation.

The base of the Bahariya Formation is nowhere open, but should unconformably lying on the basement. Superimposed on the Formation unconformably by the El Hefhuf formation of the Upper Cretaceous or ( also discordant ) from the limestone plateau of El Naqb - formation from the Eocene.

Overall interpret the Faziesverhältnisse to coastal deposition conditions, the former Neotethys might have been a tropical - hot temperate shelf sea in northern Egypt.

Fauna of the Bahariya Formation

The fossil content of the Bahariya Formation is quite versatile. In addition to a diverse fish fauna are found remains of crabs, primitive crocodiles, turtles, primitive snakes, dinosaurs and plesiosaurs. Even vegetable scraps of tree ferns ( with the mangrove Weichselia reticulata ) and angiosperms ( Angiospermae) are preserved.

Made famous was the Bahariya Formation by Stromers dinosaur finds. Unfortunately, these succumbed in World War II destruction. Published in 2001 Joshua Smith of the University of Pennsylvania, the first scientific description of, discovered in 2000 as part of new excavations in the Bahariya Formation sauropod dinosaur Paralititan stromeri. The following list contains a selection of systematic animal groups and some of their representatives, who have so far been discovered in the formation: