Student Scholars Day

Deformation in the Upper Ordovician Point Pleasant Formation, Northern Kentucky

Henry Hall Atrium 24

The Upper Ordovician Point Pleasant Formation in northern Kentucky consists of two conglomerates (interpreted by others as debris flows), two thin deformed grainstone beds, a chaotic layer, and a nodular mudstone. The lower, fine grained, rippled grainstone bed is thought to have been deposited on uneven, surface debris flows. The grainstone pinches out and is then replaced with a nodular mudstone. Atop these lies the upper, fine grained, grainstone bed. We will use hand samples and point counts of thin sections to identify the meso/micro-scale features found in these beds and compare the grainstone beds to the undeformed beds. We hypothesize that we will see evidence for deformation in the meso scale, but at the micro scale features suggesting post lithification deformation such as fractures across grains and cements will be absent. This would support the interpretation that deformation occurred prelithification and was perhaps caused by seismic activity along a submarine slope.