Supercritical and subcritical turbidity currents and their deposits - a synthesis

Common facies models of turbidite deposits are based on idealized sequences of turbidite units, which are assumed to reflect the depositional processes of a decelerating turbidity current. We show how suites of turbidite units, i.e., distinct turbidite facies associations that are easily described from core and outcrop, may characterize the entire range of large-scale dynamics of turbidity currents, enabling estimates of their densimetric Froude number (Fr; subcritical versus supercritical) and suspension fall-out rate (stratified versus nonstratified flows). The linking of facies associations with large-scale flow dynamics resolves process-facies links that were hitherto unresolved by the common turbidite facies models.