A geological study of Saudi Arabia - particularly the Red Sea Margin

Extract

[...] The common contact areas between the Arabian shield and the Read Sea basin comprises of faults and deposits, coinciding with a crustal modification and attenuation zone where the Arabian Plate continental crust becomes progressively thinner—Beginning at 40-45 km and tapering down to 15-5 km originating from the inland and ending in the coastal regions respectively. It must be mentioned here that the exact details of the evolutionary and structural characteristics of the Red Sea basin are not available. The Structural and Topographic Characteristics The structure and topography of the coastal margin of the Red Sea adjoining Saudi Arabia gives rise to the hypothetical school of thought that the margin has been segmented tectonically and has been subjected to various kinds of upliftments over the years. [...]

[...] The Precambrian rocks constitute of a majority of known deposits of metals including magnesium, iron, zinc, copper, silver and gold in Saudi Arabia. The Phanerozoic cover accounts for the oil reserves and bauxite deposits in addition to large quantities of silica sand, limestone and clay. Tectonically speaking, Saudi Arabia is located towards the south of the Arabian Plate, which is amongst the youngest plates on the earth's surface. This plate consists of a crystalline base of Precambrian crust approximately 40-45 km in thickness and between 870-550 million years old. [...]

[...] The division of Saudi Arabia and Africa started approximately 25 million years ago, which was caused due to a rift created on the sea floor that spread axially along the Gulf of Aden and the Red Sea. The rift drifted towards the northern part of the Arabian Plate which resulted in a collision with the Eurasian land mass. At the time of such tectonic developments new oceanic crusts were formed along with sedimentation in the basins of Red Sea and Gulf of Aden. [...]