3D modelling of the Tremiti salt diapir in the Gargano offshore (Adriatic Sea, southern Italy): constraints in the Tremiti Structure development

Gianvito Teofilo (*), Vincenzo Festa (*), Luisa Sabato (*), Luigi Spalluto (*) & Marcello Tropeano (*)
(*) Dipartimento di Scienze della Terra e Geoambientali, Università degli Studi di Bari "Aldo Moro", Bari, Italy. Corresponding author: Vincenzo Festa, email: vincenzo.festa@uniba.it.
Dipartimento di Scienze della Terra e Geoambientali, Università degli Studi di Bari "Aldo Moro", Via E. Orabona, 4, 70125 Bari, Italy.

The reinterpretation of public seismic profiles, the stratigraphic review of hydrocarbon exploration well logs in the Adriatic offshore of Gargano (Apulia, southern Italy), and the use of Surfer® (Golden Software, Inc.) and MoveTM (Midland Valley Ltd.) softwares, allowed us to obtain the Two Way Times (TWT) contour map and the 3D model of the upper Trias salt surface of the Tremiti diapir.
The obtained 3D model of the Tremiti diapir shows two types of shape indicating at least as many modes of salt emplacement: single flap and piercing. Inherited faults were used by salt, which promoted the contemporaneous development of piercing and single flap in the same diapiric body.
In addition, the sea floor deformations suggest that the diapirism, which mostly developed during Plio-Pleistocene time, is probably still active. Despite the NW-SE shortening due to the regional EW dextral shearing, that likely triggered halokinesis, the upward growth rate of the diapir was able to promote dip-slip kinematics, which locally hid the strike-slip one.

3D model, salt tectonics, single flap, piercing, Tremiti Islands.