The Tachrift Project: sedimentary architecture of turbidite channel-levee deposits (Tachrift Turbidite System, Taza-Guercif Basin, Tortonian, NE Morocco)

Turbidite channel-levee complexes have been the focus of extensive research from a number of modern and ancient deep-water turbidite systems over more than fifty years. Although high-resolution 3D seismic studies have recently yielded unprecedented imaging of these deposits, the internal facies complexity of a channel-levee complex remains elusive. To fill this gap, extensive well-exposed outcrops are particularly important, as they provide information on fine-scale facies heterogeneity. This contribution reports on the ongoing 'Tachrift' Project, which aims to explore 9 superimposed channel-levee complexes belonging to the Tachrift turbidite system (late Tortonian- early Messinian) of the Taza-Guercif Basin (NE Morocco). Arid climate and deep incision by ephemeral streams make for world-class, extensive, unexplored outcrops spread over an area of similar to 16 km(2). Preliminary results provide valuable insights into facies and geometry of channel-fills and correlative levees over a similar to 150 m-thick and similar to 4 km wide transect largely oblique to palaeoflow, which may contribute to improving existing models of turbidite channel belt sedimentary heterogeneity and stratigraphic evolution, applied to understand the composition of subsurface analogues.