LA VICTORIA, Formation

TERTIARY (upper Eocene)

State of Zulia, Venezuela

Author of name: L. G. Weeks, 1926 (private report).

Original reference: F. A. Sutton, 1946, pp. 1689-1690.

Original description: ibid.

Sutton (1946, pp. 1689-1690) indicated that the type locality for the formation is the outcrop of Hannatoma limestone in the La Victoria road half a kilometer west of the ranch of La Victoria in the south-central part of the District of Miranda, northeastern Zulia. The limestone at the type locality is of brackish-water to semi-marine origin, but the bulk of the formation appears to be of non-marine, probably lacustrine character. The formation consits of clays, clay shales, silts and sandstones besides the aforementioned limestone. White, gray, light brown, and dark reddish brown, fine-grained sandstones are found interbedded with the mostly dark gray and locally mottled clays and shales. Only one 2-foot limestone was logged near the top of the formation in La Victoria N° 1, a well near the type locality, but in Miranda N° 1, in eastern Miranda, several limestones and calcareous horizons were encountered in the upper part of the La Victoria section. Sutton states that the thickness of the formation was estimated to be about 610 meters, for the outcrop section. Sutton claimed that this figure is too low, at least for the center of deposition, for about 730 meters of La Victoria formation were found in La Victoria N° 1 and about 900 meters in Miranda N° 1 without reaching the bottom of the formation in either case. Sutton indicated that the formation lies unconformably upon the Las Flores and Churuguarita formation and unconformably beneath the La Rosa and younger formations. The entire area of outcrop of the La Victoria formation is confined to the south-central part of the District of Miranda, northeastern Zulia. Sutton gave a middle Oligocene age for the formation based on the presence of a large number of the gastropod Hannatoma emendorferi Olsson in the limestone at the type locality.

Dusenbury (1949, p. 149) pointed out that the age of the formation must be considered to be upper Eocene based on this same afore-mentioned species, Hannatoma emendorferi Olsson, indicating that the previous age assignment given by Sutton (1946, p. 1690) was based on the erroneous concept that the Mancora formation of Perú was middle Oligocene in age.

Leo Weingeist