Atlantic evaporites formed by evaporation of water spilled from Pacific, Tethyan, and Southern oceans

Abstract

The distribution of salt diapirs around the Atlantic Ocean, both onshore and offshore, when plotted on a closed Atlantic indicates that there are four main areas without salt and three with salt. The occurrence of massive salt deposits formed at the opening of an ocean appears to depend on (1) proximity to saline ocean waters, (2) graben structure and related occurrences of hot-spot volcanism, and (3) climatic zonation, because there are no salt deposits at equatorial or high paleolatitudes. The salt is interpreted to have formed by evaporation of intermittent spills into sub-sea-level graben over periods of a few million years.