Publication Name: The North West Shelf Australia
Authors: A.J. Mory
Date Published: July 1988
Number of Pages: 34
Reference Type: Book Section
Abstract:
The offshore portion of the Bonaparte Basin extends under the Joseph Bonaparte Gulf to Ashmore Reef to the northwest and Flinders Shoal to the north, and covers an approximately triangular area of about 250 000 km2.The oldest sediments which can be positively identified offshore are Late Devonian, although Cambrian volcanics and sediments are present in the onshore part of the basin. These sediments belong to a phase of Silurian to Carboniferous northwest rifting. The succeeding Permo-Carboniferous sequence formed during a phase of reactivated northwest rifting in which the Petrel Sub-basin continued to be the principal depocentre. New depocentres developed along the northwest margin of the basin when Mesozoic northeasterly rifting and breakup commenced. The Petrel Sub- basin, however, continued as a major site of deposition until the Late Cretaceous. Cainozoic sedimentation consists largely of carbonate shelf progradation in the outer part of the basin.
A statigraphic summary for the post-Carboniferous sequence of the basin is included as an appendix. Three new groups and thirteen new formations are defined.