The Proceedings of the Eighth International Conference on Creationism (2018)

These basal sandstone layers are easily correlated across vast areas of the continents, helping to confirm the identification of the megasequence boundaries. In contrast to the other two continents however, North America has much more extensive carbonate rock in the lowermost Tippecanoe and Kaskaskia layers (Fig. 8a). The reason for this is not fully clear. Indeed, we do observe a carbonate layer in the uppermost Sauk across much of North America (Muav Limestone and equivalent). It may be that the Flood waters did not fully drain off of the North American continent at the end of the Sauk megasequence. This may have allowed continual carbonate deposition along the edges of the continent from the upper Sauk through the earliest Tippecanoe transgression. A similar process may have then repeated in the Kaskaskia where an even more extensive carbonate layer was deposited at the onset of the third megasequence (Fig. 8a). This also may imply that the Flood waters drained off even to a lesser degree at the end of the Tippecanoe, resulting in continual carbonate deposition through the onset of the Kaskaskia transgression. Africa (Fig. 9a) and South America (Fig. 10a) preserve much less extensive deposits of the Sauk, Tippecanoe and Kaskaskia megasequences compared to North America. These two continents apparently experienced much less Flooding at this juncture of the Flood (Clarey and Werner 2017). Indeed, each of the first three megasequences across Africa and South America stack one on top of the other fairly uniformly. This is especially noticeable across North Africa where nearly identical locations are blanketed again and again, by the Sauk, Tippecanoe and Kaskaskia (Fig. 9a). The similar extent of each of these first three megasequences also argues against erosion as the major factor explaining their present distribution. Erosive processes would tend to leave more randomly distributed remnants and not the consistency that is observed (Clarey and Werner 2017). These first three megasequences likely represent the earliest and lowest Flood levels (Clarey and Werner 2017) and were deposited in areas that were possibly pre-Flood shallow seas (Clarey and Werner 2018). Figures 8b, 9b and 10b show the Absaroka, Zuni and Tejas basal rock types and their present extent across North America, Africa and South America, respectively. Again, there are extensive basal sandstones that can be correlated at the base of the Absaroka across the centralAfrican and SouthAmerican continents (Fig 9b and 10b). These blanket sandstones also allow easy correlation of the latter three megasequence boundaries across vast areas of the continents. And again, North America seems to be a bit of an exception as it contains a mixed sandstone and shale lithology at the base of the Absaroka, Zuni and Tejas megasequences (Fig. 8b). The reason for this difference is not immediately clear, but is possibly related to tectonic activity and/or subduction along the West Coast. Figures 8b, 9b and 10b also detail the break-up of Pangaea as the Flood progressed. The first offshore sediments along the East Clarey and Werner ◀ A Flood origin for the geological column ▶ 2018 ICC 347 Figure 16. Map of the extent of the Morrison Formation across the American West (Zuni megasequence). Taken by permission from Morris (2012). Figure 17. Map of the extent of the Pierre Shale across the American West (Zuni megasequence). Modified from St-Onge (2017) by Susan Windsor. © 2017 Institute for Creation Research. Used by permission.