• Email Us: [email protected]
  • Contact Us: +1 718 874 1545
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

Medical Market Report

  • Home
  • All Reports
  • About Us
  • Contact Us

North Sea “Sinkites” Appear To Defy Rules Of Geology On Never-Before-Seen Scale

August 4, 2025 by Deborah Bloomfield

Much of the bottom of the North Sea is upside down, with older layers of sand lying on top of younger ones. This defiance of basic geological principles has been seen elsewhere, but never on this scale. Now, two geologists think they have an explanation.

The North Sea has been extensively drilled for oil, hosts the greatest concentration of offshore wind farms in the world, and is shallow enough to make exploration relatively easy. Consequently, you might expect it to be well understood, but its capacity to surprise us remains undiminished, particularly in more northern regions.

Extensive 3D seismic imaging has revealed enormous mounds of sand, some stretching for kilometers, that lie beneath the sea floor with older layers on top. “This discovery reveals a geological process we haven’t seen before on this scale,” said Professor Mads Huuse of The University of Manchester in a statement. “What we’ve found are structures where dense sand has sunk into lighter sediments that floated to the top of the sand, effectively flipping the conventional layers we’d expect to see and creating huge mounds beneath the sea.”

Huuse and co-author Jan Rudjord of Aker BP call these structures sinkites and floatites, and say they are the largest of their type ever seen, kilometers wide and up to 200 meters (660 feet) deep. The intrusions are thought to date to the Late Miocene and Pliocene, 7-4 million years ago, and Rudjord and Huuse attribute their presence to a combination of three factors.

The first ingredient is a deposit of rigid but quite porous – and therefore light – material, made mostly of small marine fossils with an average density of 1.8 grams per cubic centimeter (less than double water). Rudjord and Huuse call this bio-silicious ooze, and attribute it to a blooming of microscopic marine creatures when the North Atlantic sent an upwelling of nutritious water into the North Sea. The next ingredient is quantities of denser (2.1 grams per cubic centimeter) sand capable of liquifying and flowing through at least some of the older rock. 

The third necessary component was something that triggered the sand’s downward flow. Huuse and Rudjord think either earthquakes or sharp changes in underground pressure could have been responsible. Once some of the sand sank beneath the ooze, “This caused a buoyancy force on the lighter ooze blocks, which detached and started floating like rafts in the sand,” the authors write.

An intrusion of younger sand sunk intlo the bio-silicate ooze on Northern North Sea floor

An intrusion of younger sand sank into the bio-silicate ooze on the Northern North Sea floor.

Image Credit: Mads Huuse 

“This research shows how fluids and sediments can move around in the Earth’s crust in unexpected ways. Understanding how these sinkites formed could significantly change how we assess underground reservoirs, sealing, and fluid migration — all of which are vital for carbon capture and storage,” said Huuse. Understanding the processes that created the sinkites could also make it easier for future operations to find the region’s remaining oil and gas.

The existence of enormous sandstone intrusions on the floor of the Northern North Sea has been known for decades, but geologists have debated their origins. Rudjord and Huuse hope their explanation will resolve the question, although Huuse admits not everyone who has seen their work is convinced yet. 

To satisfy the doubters, the authors hope to find other examples, but admit they do not at this point know whether intrusions on this scale exist anywhere else in the world. They also propose more detailed sampling, which they argue could confirm their explanation.

The study is published in Communications Earth & Environment.

Deborah Bloomfield
Deborah Bloomfield

Related posts:

  1. European stock futures slide ahead of ECB meeting
  2. Three New Hydrothermal Vents Found, And They’re Shrimply Stunning
  3. The Neurology Of Taste: How Your Brain Perceives Flavor
  4. Fantastic Corpse Myths And How To Debunk Them

Source Link: North Sea “Sinkites” Appear To Defy Rules Of Geology On Never-Before-Seen Scale

Filed Under: News

Primary Sidebar

  • Solar Systems 100 Times Smaller Than Ours Are Possible – Thanks To Rogue Planets
  • North Sea “Sinkites” Appear To Defy Rules Of Geology On Never-Before-Seen Scale
  • The Iberian Ribbed Newt Might Just Have The World’s Most Metal Defense Mechanism
  • There’s Only One Black Moon In 2025 And It’s Happening This Month
  • For First Time In Decades, Winter-Run Chinook Salmon Spotted In Upstream Californian River
  • JWST Shines New Light On 2500 Sources In Iconic Hubble Ultra Deep Field Image
  • Humans And Neanderthals Hooked Up Three Times. Here’s Where It Happened
  • What Happened To Percy Fawcett? The Explorer Who Went In Search “The Lost City Of Z”
  • COVID-19 And Flu Could “Reignite” Dormant Cancer Cells And Bring On New Tumors
  • Do Hair And Nails Really Grow Faster In Summer?
  • Wondrous And Worrying Sights: What Explorers Discovered At The Bottom Of The Great Blue Hole
  • What’s The Biggest Volcano In The World? It Depends How You’re Measuring
  • “Every Species On The Planet Self-Medicates In Some Way”: How Wild Animals Use Medicine
  • Deepest Complex Ecosystem Ever Discovered 10 Kilometers Below The Sea, 892-Kilometer “Megaflash” Lightning Sets New World Record, And Much More This Week
  • The Life And Death Of David Vetter, The Boy Who Lived His Whole Life In A Bubble
  • Time’s Arrow Within Glass Appears To Go Both Ways, Raising Huge Questions
  • World’s “Oldest Baby” Born From Embryo Frozen In 1994 In New World Record
  • What Can Spain’s “Tunnel Of Bones” Tell Us About The Fate Of Human Species On The Brink Of Extinction?
  • Rhino Horns Go Radioactive As Anti-Poaching Project Gets Off The Ground
  • Manta Rays Officially Get Third New Species – 15 Years After First Suspected
  • Business
  • Health
  • News
  • Science
  • Technology
  • +1 718 874 1545
  • +91 78878 22626
  • [email protected]
Office Address
Prudour Pvt. Ltd. 420 Lexington Avenue Suite 300 New York City, NY 10170.

Powered by Prudour Network

Copyrights © 2025 · Medical Market Report. All Rights Reserved.

Go to mobile version