An estimate of Albian sea-level amplitudes and its implications for the duration of stratigraphic hiatuses

Carbonate platform tops are reliable but incomplete recorders of past sea-level fluctuations as they are riddled with hiatuses of various durations. Basinal sections represent a more complete record but fail to register regressive-transgressive events with small to moderate amplitudes. We seek to avoid these problems by combining information on past sea-level fluctuations from coeval platform top, slope and basinal sections. The outcome of this study is a semiquantitative Albian sea-level curve from the southern Tethyan margin in Oman. In subaerial exposure surfaces, the northern Oman margin recorded 4 high-amplitude (∼ 50 m); 6 intermediate-amplitude (∼ 30 m); and 26 low-amplitude (∼ 10 m) regressive-transgressive cycles. Hiatuses that cap the platform top depositional sequences might account for between 30% to 70% of the cycle duration. The resulting platform top depositional sequences have frequencies in the order of 230 ± 20 kyr; i.e. they are in the time range of orbital eccentricity cycles. It appears that at least some of these Albian regressive-transgressive cycles were rapid and punctuated, as opposed to sinus-shaped Milankovitchian sea-level oscillations. © 2002 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.