GEOLOGY OF AFGHANISTAN

• Class Goals: Understand the Historical Geology of Afghanistan

• Understand Basic Stratigraphy, Structure, Tectonics and
Regional Setting of Afghanistan
• Understand the History of Each Major Tectonic Block in
Afghanistan
• Understand the History of Afghanistan’s Geology from the
Precambrian to the Present
• Class Format: Lectures, Homework and Map Exercise
Textbook: “Geology and Mineral Resources of Afghanistan” by Abdullah and
Chmyriov (2008 English Translation)
Instructor: Len Stitt
Email: [email protected]
North Afghan Platform
 Paleozoic of Afghanistan – Part 3
Carboniferous
Paleozoic Rocks are found in all of the
Blocks of Afghanistan except for the Farah
Block and the Kandahar Trough.
• Undifferentiated Devonian-Lower
Carboniferous rocks are found in the Band-I-
Bayan and Central Pamir Blocks.
• Carboniferous rocks occur in all the regions of
Afghanistan.
 Carboniferous of Afghanistan
The Carboniferous Period is subdivided into
the following Stages (from bottom to top):
• Lower Cambrian Stages:
• Tournasian
• Visean
• Namurian
• Middle Cambrian Stages
• Bashkirian
• Moscovian
• Upper Cambrian Stages
• Gjelian
• Orenburgian
The Devonian-Carboniferous of the Band-I-
Bayan and Central Pamir Blocks
The Devonian-Carboniferous of the Band-I-
Bayan and Central Pamir Blocks
• Undifferentiated Upper Devonian-Lower Carboniferous
deposits are mapped in the Band-I-Bayan and Central Pamir
Blocks.
• These rocks occur in the Kohe Taraqa and Kohe Qaftarkhan
mountains, in the upper reaches of the Tagaw-i-Takcah River,
in Kohe Pud and Kohe Safad mountains, in the Gok River’s
drainage basin, in the upper reaches of the Torbulak River,
near Kirmoq-i-Kotal, Sato, Kotale and Hajigak passes, and in
the Turkman, Shewa and other drainage basins.
• They are known in literature as the Rabat-i-Poy, Hajigak and
Zindajan series.
• The sequence is composed of grey and black inequibedded
clayey and clastic-detrital organogenic limestones interbedded
with sandstones, siltstones, marls and dolomites.
• Their thickness varies from 180m in the Kohe Pud Mountains
to 800m in the Gok River drainage basin. The beds lie
transgressively on Middle Devonian deposits and are
transgressively overlapped by Permian beds.
• The best studied are the Upper Devonian-Lower Carboniferous
sections from Kohe Pud and Shewa river drainage basins. The
sections exhibit somewhat different features.
 The Devonian-Carboniferous of the Band-I-
Bayan and Central Pamir Blocks
In the Kohe Pud area of the Band-I-Bayan Block, the section is most
complete. The Middle Devonian limestones are overlain disconformably by
the following succession of beds:
• Upper Devonian sandstone, inequigranular, quartzose, enclosing
limestone lenses. These contain Upper Devonian (Frasnian)
faunatabulate corals, and stromatopores.
• Next are limestones interbedded with siltstones and sandstones and
enclosing a 1.5m bed of red iron-bearing oolitic limestone 10 meters
above the base. They contain Upper Devonian (Frasnian) brachiopods,
tetracorals, tabulate corals and crinoids.
• Next is a limestone that is red (ferriferous) at the base (15 m) and
yellow-grey at the top (10 m). The limestone contains Upper Devonian
(Famennian) brachiopods.
• Next is a Lower Carboniferous limestone, medium-bedded, carrying
chert nodules. Fossils are Carboniferous (Late Tournaisian-Early Visean)
brachiopods.
• Next is a thick-bedded limestone. Fossils include Carboniferous (Late
Visean-Namurian) brachiopods and Visean-Namurian tetracorals.
• At the top is a limestone, thick-bedded, with Carboniferous brachiopods.
• The beds are overlain disconformably by Permian quartz sandstones.
The Devonian-Carboniferous of the Band-I-
Bayan and Central Pamir Blocks
In the Central Pamir Block, the Lower Carboniferous has
been found in the Shewa River drainage basin only in two
isolated fault wedges, at the Wuranshor and Gulzary
passes.
• Carboniferous (Upper Tournaisian) beds (100-150 m) are
found at the Wuranshor Pass and consist of ash-grey
bedded clayey limestones with brachiopod and coral
fossils.
• At the Gulzary Pass, Carboniferous (Visean-Namurian or
only Visean) beds outcrop. They are composed of dark
grey clayey limestones (50-100 m) with shale interbeds
and remains of tetracorals.
• Thickness of the Carboniferous (Upper Tournaisian and
Visean-Namurian) deposits in the Shewa River drainage
basin is 150-250m, the overall thickness of these and the
Upper Devonian strata being 650 to 750m.
Carboniferous of Western Part of N. Afghan Platform
Lower Carboniferous of Western Part of N. Afghan Platform
Within this territory, Lower Tournaisian strata outcrop in the Kohe
Dawindar and Firozkoh ridges where they are composes chiefly of
volcanics enclosing interbeds and lenses of phyllite-like slate and
limestone.
• The strata are 2,000-2,500 meters thick.
• In the Kohe Dawindar Ridge, the most common rocks are quartz and
dacite porphyry, basic volcanics, tuffs of acid and basic volcanics,
and tufogenic sandstones.
• In the Firozkoh Ridge, the considered volcanics, known there as the
Darrae Takht Series, are chiefly represented by andesite porphyries
and their tuffs, and at some levels by basic tuffs and lavas enclosing
interbeds and lenses of quartz porphyry, dacite porphyry and jasper.
• Some sections are characterized by predominance of pyroclastic
rocks, others by prevalence of lavas.
• All the rocks had undergone albitization, epidotization,
actinolitization and carbonatization.
Lower Carboniferous of Western Part of N. Afghan Platform
Within this territory, the Lower Tournaisian-Visean sequence
includes the lower and middle parts of the Pahlowana Formation
in Kohe Dawindar Ridge and the lower part of the Syahsang
Series in the Firozkoh Ridge.
• In the Kohe Dawindar Ridge, the Pahlowana Formation lies on the
eroded surface of volcanic rocks dated tentatively as Lower Tournaisian.
• It is composed of alternating 2- to 40-meter beds of siltstone, sandstone
and limestone. The formation includes interbeds of small-pebble
conglomerates, gravelstones and volcanics, quartz porphyries and their
tuffs and basalt porphyries and their tuffs. Coal intercalations and
lenticular seams (1-2 m) are encountered at the top.
• The total thickness of the formation is 600-700 meters including
approximately 400 or 500 meters of Upper Tournaisian-Visean beds.
• Tournasian tetracorals were collected from the lower part of the
formation.
• Visean fossils collected in the middle of the formation include
tetracorals, tabulate corals, and foraminifers.
Lower Carboniferous of Western Part of N. Afghan Platform
In the Firoskoh Ridge the Syahsang Series lies on Lower Tournaisian
volcanics disconformably. It consists of sandstones, shales,
limestones, siltstones, conglomerates and gravelstones.
• The thickness of the series varies from place to place ranging within 2,000 and
4,000 meters. The lower part of the series (1,000-2,000 m) is tentatively dated
as Upper Tournaisian-Visean.
• It is sub-divided into three units: (1) basal conglomerates, 60-70 per cent of
which consist of pebbles of granitic and volcanic rocks (20-50 m); (2)
inequibedded limestones, marls, sandstones and siltstones (150-200 m); and (3)
polymictic and oligomictic sandstones and siltstones enclosing lenses and
interbeds of limestones, conglomerates and gravelstones (800-1,750 m).
• Organic remains were found in the upper and middle units.
• Late Tournaisian fossils derived from the middle unit are algae and
foraminifers, tabulate corals.
• Visean and Visean-Namurian fossils were derived from the upper unit. The
collections differ depending on the site and stratigraphic level. They include
algae, foraminifers, tetracorals and tabulate corals.
• The contact between this sequence and the Namurian beds is obscure and is
drawn tentatively inside a uniform terrigenous rock sequence lying
approximately in the middle of the section.
Lower Carboniferous of Western Part of N. Afghan Platform
Within this territory, Namurian rocks compose the
upper 200 meters of the Pahlowana Formation in Kohe
Dawinder Ridge and the lower 500 to 1,000 meters of
the portion of the Syahsang Series in the Firozkoh
Ridge.
• The rocks are dark and variegated sandstones and siltstones
enclosing interbeds and lenses of limestone, conglomerate and
gravelstone.
• In the Kohe Dawindar Ridge, the rocks bear Namurian
brachiopods.
• In the Firozkoh Ridge, the rocks are unfossiliferous and were
dated as Namurian on the basis of their stratigraphic position.
• Their relations with the Visean and Middle Carboniferous are
conformable.