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

Coast of North America and the West Coast of Africa appear in the Absaroka rock record (Figs. 8b and 9b), indicating the opening of the North Atlantic Ocean began at this time. Later in the Flood, during the time of Zuni deposition, the SouthernAtlantic also began to form as sediments first appear off of eastern South America and southwestern Africa simultaneously (Figs. 9b, 10b). The split of Greenland from North America is also indicated by deposits that first appear offshore Greenland and Canada during the Zuni (Fig. 8b). And even the opening of the Red Sea is indicated by the abrupt appearance of a thick layer of salt during the Tejas (Fig. 9b). The Absaroka also documents a dramatic shift from almost exclusively marine fossils in the first three megasequences to a more mixed land and marine fauna (Clarey and Werner 2018). This trend of more and more land animal fossils also continued upward through the deposition of the Zuni and Tejas (Clarey and Werner 2018). The increasing numbers of coal beds and land animal fossils, combined with more extensive sedimentation across the continents, all indicate that the Flood waters were likely impacting significant portions of the pre-Flood land surfaces during the deposition of the Absaroka megasequence (Clarey and Werner 2018). Figures 8b, 9b and 10b also indicate that the maximum Flood coverage of the continents was likely reached at the time of Zuni deposition. This is confirmed by the findings of Clarey and Werner (2017) who demonstrated that the global volume of sedimentation also peaked during the Zuni megasequence. Therefore, the Zuni is likely reflective of the Flood waters reaching and inundating the highest pre-Flood land elevations (Clarey and Werner 2018). For these reasons, we interpret the Zuni as the high water level of the Flood. Figure 11 shows a nearly continuous carbonate layer, correlated across North Africa and the Middle East, indicating that the Flood waters likely never fully receded from these locations during the deposition of the entire Zuni interval. This is consistent with the above observations suggesting that the Zuni was the likely highest water level of the Flood. Although not the intent of this paper, the findings from this study have implications for the Flood/post-Flood boundary. The record of continuous carbonate deposition from the Zuni through the Tejas in North Africa and the Middle East (Fig. 11) indicates that the Flood waters could not have receded fully from this area until the Late Miocene and possibly even later. The thick Tejas salt deposit in the Red Sea further supports that this area was still under marine influence also. This finding is similar to the conclusion reached by Snelling (2010) for Israel, but to a greater degree. Snelling (2010) documented continuous carbonate deposition from the Cretaceous through the Eocene in Israel, and accordingly, picked the Flood/ post-Flood boundary in or atop the Oligocene. Our findings suggest a much more extensive and continuous cycle of carbonate rock was deposited across much of North Africa and the Middle East. In accordance with the conclusion of Snelling (2010), this would place the Flood/post-Flood boundary as high as the Miocene and possibly higher across the entire southern Mediterranean region. Incidentally, this is also the area just to the south of Turkey, which Clarey and Werner ◀ A Flood origin for the geological column ▶ 2018 ICC 348 Figure 19. Chart showing the relationship of the so-called five great extinctions to the megasequences. Taken from Clarey (2015).