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Spatial and Temporal Distribution of Salt- and Shale-Detached Contractional Deformation, Mexican Northwestern Gulf of Mexico
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DOI：10.1029/2025TC009304.png)
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Abstract
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In the northwestern Gulf of Mexico, gravity-driven contractional deformation is recorded across the Salina del Bravo, the Perdido and Peripheral fold belts, and the Mexican Cordilleras. Integrating seismic interpretation, structural mapping, and analysis, we examine the spatial and temporal partitioning of shortening above three principal detachments: the Louann Salt, lower Paleocene shales, and middle Eocene to lower Oligocene shales. The Louann Salt is the master detachment in most of the area. Louann-detached deformation transitions from fold-dominated in the northern Perdido Fold Belt to thrust-dominated southward and beneath the Salina del Bravo, becoming absent in the Mexican Cordilleras. The lower Paleocene detachment is locally restricted, acting as a minor intermediate flat above the Louann level. The mid-Eocene to lower Oligocene shales serve varying structural roles: they underlie a proximal perched fold belt and provide distal decoupling in the Salina del Bravo, constitute the upper flat to deep thrusts in the Peripheral Fold Belt, and represent the primary detachment for gravity-linked systems in the Mexican Cordilleras. Deformation propagated basinward and southward in three distinct phases: (a) pre–mid Eocene Louann-detached shortening that generated salt-cored folds, thrusts, and incipient salt sheets; (b) Oligocene strain partitioning between the Louann Salt and overpressured shale decoupling levels; and (c) Neogene reactivation of ramp-flat configurations and development of the Mexican Cordilleras.
Keywords:
linked contractional-extensional systems
salt-shale bearing passive margins
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