Sand Pipes

​​                                                                                                                                                          B-H
By Matys Weiser
In previous articles we explain formation of sedimentary layers forming Strata visible in many mountainous regions of the Earth.
In the second article we briefly explained the process of formation of Fossils.
In the third article we take particular look into commonly and wrongly designated as aeolian (dry dessert) source of Navajo Sandstone.
Area of the United States named Colorado Plateau with its canyons including the Grand Canyon is especially a natural show of its beauty but also gives the possibility to see what lies beneath our feet.

Grand Canyon

Canyonlands NP

​Colorado Plateau geologic uplift raised layers of strata and water did the rest. Sometimes buckled and twisted and sometimes horizontally straight for hundreds of miles geological layers were washed away by mass of water and then eroded due to extensive precipitation.
All of this allowed us to see a cross section of thousands of feet of sedimentary deposits.
In the Grand Canyon alone we are able to see more than a mile of not only sedimentary deposits but also deep cut through the basement rocks ("V" shape bottom part of the canyon) forming foundations for later deposits.
The awesome splendor of the Canyon is a show of G-d’s sense of beauty but if we learn the language of the rocks as John Wesley Powel said, we can read and understand the history of our planet.

White Pocket Vermilion Cliffs NM

​The unique and vast beauty of the region doesn’t end in the Grand Canyon, nor the layers of sedimentary rocks. Bended down in gigantic monocline they expose another several thousand feet of strata in the Grand Staircase of Escalante subregion of the Colorado Plateau. Zion and Bryce National Parks are part of those giant geological steps of cliffs spreading through hundreds of miles of desert and mountains.
Somewhere in the center of the Plateau, not too far east from Bryce National Park, Kodachrome State Park is another exceptional place to visit for its beauty. Kodachrome Basin is also a place of geological formations called Sand Pipes.
On a family trip almost 20 years ago, we attempted to drive Cottonwood Canyon Road from the north direction. We stopped to see the highest natural arch in the world – Grosvenor Arch. Few miles further south we have to turn back. Our vehicle would probably make the first wash crossing if not for the weight of it. Five persons and food for five persons for several weeks of travels. It was not easier to find kosher food those days in the area…

Grosvenor Arch Escalante NM

​On the way out of the Cottonwood Road I noticed interesting rock formations cutting through the horizontal strata at 90 degrees angle, cutting all of the visible layers. It took many years until I found the time to walk around the park despite the fact that I was camping there several times.

This is the result of my research on those not quite unique formations:

​Sand Pipe formation can be included to the broader family of Dikes, usually magmatic injectates penetrating rock formations under tremendous pressure from beneath. Hot magma flowed up filling and expanding fractures in Igneous and sedimentary rock layers, forming lines of foreign rock often causing metaphorization of surrounding host rocks. Beautiful examples of such geological activity can be seen in another show of nature in Gunnison Black Canyon in Colorado.

​The other common sand injectates are Mud Cracks. What is considered by some as fill-up of other material from above in the dried mud cracks, some geologists postulate that those much smaller than previously mentioned injectates were pushed into mud layer from above under the pressure of the weight of new material cumulating directly above what is considered dried mud but in fact it was still wet layer of mud now with new mass of sediment penetrating from above.

Mud Crack Formation Bear Ears NM

With G-d help we hope to come back to the topic of alleged dry mud cracks in the future as the difference between an entirely wet model of strata or wet cumulating and drying consecutively, is crucial for our framework of understanding the planet's past.
Sand pipes, the main subject of this article, are made from much softer material than classic dikes although they are usually raised from beneath under the pressure of material collecting above. 
In some cases, material in the pipes comes from close surrounding rocks or rather wet material within which the pipes were formed. They don’t form branches as classic dikes but rather are shooting straight up through the layers of host rock.
“Clastic pipes can form by the diapiric rise of plastic sediment, by fluid (water or gas) escape and associated slurry intrusion or foundering, by collapse accompanying or following the removal of underlying material, and by the filling of pipe-shaped cavities.” US Geological Survey 1808L.
In Kodachrome State Park and its direct vicinities there are 67 counted Sand pipes. Some of them standing alone as the encompassing host rock layers eroded, some of them entirely or partially embedded in the surrounding host strata.

​The flow of the material in this area is recognized as traveling from lower layers of strata in the upper direction.
Most of the pipes are crossing up the horizontal strata in almost vertical lines. Some of them slightly bending as they probably found less resistive material while being injected up. Most of them are round or almost round in diameter. The longest or rather tallest of the towers is more than 170 ft high. The thickest of them is some 50 feet in diameter. The majority of the pipes, however, are not of such a big size and especially those still partially embedded in the host rock can be just a few feet in diameter.
Some of the pipes contain broken angular pebbles while others may have carbonized wood.

​“Any suggestion for mechanism must consider the timing of the intrusions. Hannum (1980) made no attempt to date the intrusives other than to note that the majority of the pipes cut or are encased in the Gunsight Butte Member of the Entrada Sandstone. Hannum further stated that these sandstone intrusives were not observed in the Winsor Member of the Carmel Formation (that is lower/earlier deposit /MW/). Hannum's observation that limited exposure of the pipe hosting units, differential erosion, and restrictive access precludes an accurate assessment of the pipe distribution. Hannum (1980) stated that the base of any one pipe is not exposed but also suggests that the material making up the intrusives came from the lower part of the Winsor Member and the Paria River Member of the Carmel Formation. Hornbacher (1984) made many of the same observations as Hannum but offers a more detailed suggestion as to the timing of the intrusives. Hornbacher 1984) stated that one of the pipes penetrates the Escalante member of the Entrada Sandstone there by dating the intrusion later than that member. Hornbacher further states that one pipe had a convoluted, massive, tan-brown conglomerate at its top. By comparing pebble counts and slew analysis of this conglomerate with conglomerates collected from two units of the Plio-Pleistocene conglomerate Hornbacher concluded that the intrusions occurred after the deposition of the lower conglomerate unit, the channel conglomerate, but before the deposition of the upper conglomerate unit, the sheet conglomerate. This allows the area to be saturated with water from the river or rivers that transported the cobbles and finer clasts that make up the Plio-Pleistocene conglomerate. While these sediments were saturated a movement on the Paunsaugunt fault generated an earthquake with sufficient energy to mobilize saturated sediments from the underlying units namely the Paria River and Winsor Members as well as contributions from the Thousand Pockets Tongue of the Page Sandstone.

​“Hannum (1980) suggested that the pipes and dikes are the product of a cold water springs that carried the fine} sand from below and made the pipes particularly the smaller ones. Hannum also suggests that an earthquake could have liquified already water-bearing units and the resulting injection would cause these structures to come about. The cold water spring suggestion may serve to explain the smaller pipes but the presence of cobbles and gravel within the pipe is difficult to explain through a cold water spring mechanism. Hornbacher (1984) discussed several mechanisms that range from some type of rapid loading of sediments that would cause entrapped water bearing sediments to eventually expel these water rich sediments into the overlying host rocks in a diapiric style structure to having an earthquake trigger intrusion of water rich sediments in a liquefaction style of mechanism. Hornbacher (1984) favored the earthquake triggered mechanism because the intrusives are closely related to the two small fault traces that lie just north of Shepard's Point. Hornbacher stated that the intrusives are not brecciated or rotated in the lower portion of a monocline and, according to his preferred mechanism, the water saturated environment required for the intrusion event was available near an ancestral Paria River (Hornbacher, 1984)” “Geology of Kodachrome Basin State Park, Utah” Jame L. Baer and Robert H. Steed

​Hannum’s proposition is proven incorrect by all geologists undertaking research on the subject subsequently.
Hornbacher suggests that water moving Plio/Pleistocene deposits laid above Entrada SandStone, somehow saturated 150 million of years of solid deposits and with some other mechanism, possibly earthquake, those deposits become liquid again. This in turn allowed the injectates to flow up. After that all the rocks solidified again.
This theory is self-evidently preposterous.
Authors provide their own theory:
“While there is some merit to the mechanism as proposed by Hornbacher (1984) we think that it is much more complicated than the data indicate. Our proposed mechanism much simpler and meets a critical factor that Hornbacher's model ignores, namely the time interval from deposition of the Jurassic units in question and the Plio-Pleistocene intrusion event. If one approximates the age of the Carmel Formation at 155 to 160 million years and the Plio-Pleistocene conglomerates deposited 1 to 2 million years ago then the units from which the pipe making material came were largely dormant for 150 million years or more. Another concern is the need to saturate the Jurassic rocks at this late time in order to make them mechanically more susceptible to earthquake-initiated intrusion. It may be that the timing of the intrusion as proposed by Hornbacher is driven more by the earthquake part of the mechanism than any other factor. In our model the Plio-Pleistocene conglomerates are not considered to be important as time constraints.” (Ibidem)
Just ignore major part of Hotnbacher’s detailed research and data provided.
“The slurry, in some places, contained sufficient amounts of organic matter to reduce the iron compounds in the host rocks as the slurry injected and often times scoured its way. Hannum (1980) reported the finding of pieces of carbonized wood in some dikes. This fossil wood, along with other organic matter, from sabhka sediments produced the reducing slurry. The presence of large blocks found in some of the pipes can be explained by the scouring and buoyancy associated with the rising slurry.” (Ibidem)
In other words, soft, muddy matter made it true through the rock because for millions of years it contained organic material.
One preposterous theory replaced by another even more preposterous.

​As we read above, it is postulated but not proven that pipes originate from Paria River member or Carmel formation which according to geologist was wet environment when deposited. Then pipes are cutting through or some of them originate in Winsor member of Carmel formation, also designated as originally wet deposits.
After that, the pipes are or were embedded in 550 ft of Entrada sandstone of marine origins according to the latest designation as in previous decades, Entrada was previously considered of aeolian origins. (US Geological Survey 1808L)
It is self-understood that wet/soft deposits are necessary not only as a source of the injectites but also for the medium which injectates are injected through.
According to old earth and evolutionary geologists the pipes soft liquid material would have to push through the 150 million of years of deposits. Although all the deposits which the pipes are cutting through are recognized as originally wet deposits, it is also recognized that after drying they hardened in a very short time. Even in a wet environment the muddy deposit hardened quickly depending on the amount of cementing minerals and pressure of material collected above.
Baer and Steed tend to ignore the Hornbacher observation of partial penetration of the Pleistocene deposit, citing as the major problem the hardening host rocks over the period of 150 million of years.
Their conclusion is that sand injectates ended in the upper Entrada sandstone of the Jurassic era, which those deposits would have to remained in diagenetic stage i.e., wet/soft, for just 14 to 15 million of years.
Reduction of the age of the deposits which the clastic infusion of the pipes must travel to only 10% of original 150.000.000 to 15.000.000 is far from feasible explanation of liquid or semiliquid character of part of Carmel formation and entire Entrada formation for such prolonged time.
Between the Entrada sandstone and Pleistocene conglomerates right above, we have obviously large unconformity. The rest of Jurassic, Cretaceous and most Cenozoic rocks are missing.
And if they were there above before they eroded, the pressure created by those deposits would lithify the deposits where the pipes are cutting through.
“These air-fall ash deposits introduce more silica and provide lavender to red colors. A thickness of 110 feet (34 m) was measured by Hornbacher (1984). Thompson and Stokes (1970) described a subtle but significant unconformity that they thought marked the top of the Escalante Member. The Upper Jurassic Curtis and the Summerville Formations typically overlie the Entrada Sandstone and are found in the general area, but these formations are missing near KBSP because of erosion prior to deposition of the Henrieville Sandstone.” (Ibidem)

General view of strata in KCHSP

One of the regions rich with sand pipes is San Juan Basin in New Mexico.
“Clastic pipes occur throughout much of the Phanerozoic strata of the Colorado Plateau and provide a unique opportunity to test the validly of various deformation and triggering mechanism hypotheses in the context of their tectono-stratigraphic and paleoenvironmental settings. Pipes dominantly occur in Jurassic strata (…) The greatest geographic concentrations of pipes occur in three trends: (1) a northeast trend from the Lake Powell to Moab areas of southern and southeastern Utah, (2) an east–west trend in northern Arizona within and north of the Grand Canyon, and (3) a west-northwest–east-southeast trend along Interstate 40 west of Albuquerque, New Mexico.” “Clastic pipe characteristics and distributions throughout the Colorado Plateau: Implications for paleoenvironment and paleo seismic controlsF. Wheatley , M.A. Chan , D.A. Sprinkel “
“At San Juan Basin Lupton, the Cow Springs occupies the entire interval from the top of the Entrada to the base of the Morrison.”
“The full vertical extent of a pipe is nowhere indisputably exposed. The original tops of almost all pipes have been removed by recent erosion, and almost all pipes extend beneath the present outcrop surface” US Geological Survey 1808L.
It is safe to assume that Pipes, if indeed originating in Paria member of Carmel formation, are cutting Entrada sandstone and are continuing through the deposits of middle Jurassic Cow Spring formation and at least part of late Jurassic Morison formation.
In fact, article in US Geological Survey 1808L asserts:
“Although considerable evidence exists for relatively early pipe formation, we have seen little evidence to support the conclusion of Schlee (1963) and Moench and Schlee (1967) that the pipes in what is now called the Wanakah Formation formed contemporaneously with Wanakah deposition. They cited thickness changes in beds adjacent to pipes in the Horse Mesa Member of the Wanakah as suggesting deposition in sags around pipes, but the evidence of that type that we have seen is restricted to the Morrison Formation. Contacts of sets of crossbeds in the Horse Mesa Member of the Wanakah Formation and in the Cow Springs Sandstone are, for the most part, remarkably even and parallel and do not suggest local sagging of the depositional surface contemporaneous with pipe growth. Probably most of the pipes formed during Morrison time.”
That adds few, however insignificant, millions of years when parts of middle and late Jurassic rocks would have to remain liquified.
“A prelithification origin of the pipes is suggested by the fact that drag folding of beds adjacent to the ring faults bounding the pipes involves considerable stretching and thinning of beds. Convolute folding of beds within a few pipes also implies that the sediment was unlithified.” US Geological Survey 1808L

​ The content of the clastic pipes indicates that much of the material inside the pipes is contemporary to the material of surrounding rocks. Authors of above survey suggest creation of the pipes happened while Morison formation was deposited. This is of course, if we disregard again evidence provided by Hornbacher placing the geological event causing the formation of clastic pipes in Plio/Pleistocene.
We can state in definite terms that the existence of the Sand Pipes crossing several layers of Strata dated as millions of years old creates an unsolvable query for evolutionists and Old Earth creationists.
So far, all the attempts to explain the formations of Sand Pipes are ignoring certain laws of physics and chemistry or ignoring parts of data.
We are far from using this single subject as the proof for Young Earth creationism and Flood model of Earth geology, however, undeniably, existence of Sand Pipes fits into this model.
If most of the geological deposits were laid as waves of mud, mixtures or antediluvian vegetation, marine and terrestrial, volcanic deposits mixed with water; all the deposits involved in creation of the Sand Pipes were wet and pliable sometime within the year of Mabul Flood and perhaps years after.
In such a scenario, organic matter trapped under layers of sediment would be organically or chemically altered producing sizable gas or organic liquid bubbles. Either way, if bubbles were gas or liquid, under the pressure of material above, they would move upward creating vertical channels immediately filled up with material traveling along from the source layer of liquefied strata. In some of the pipes the gas would resort to the sandy material in the layers which the gas would travel through as it seems to be a case in many sand pipes from New Mexico.

---

​In my recent travels I spotted what looks like a sand pipe in Goblins State Park in Utah.

​Goblins are formed in Entrada Sandstone. Right above red almost purple goblins, lays a green/gray strata layer of Curtis formation. Within the red rocks of Entrada Goblins, there are few hills seemingly made of material of Curtis formation shaped as haystack. It is difficult to hypothesize that those greenish hills are remnants of eroded sand pipes, but one formation looks like classic sand pipe and is made of material resembling that of Curtis formation. If this is the case, it would be a sand pipe filled up with material from higher rather than lower or parallel layers. At this moment I have no theory for the mechanism of creation of a sand pipe filled with material from above other than a fast moving up gas bubble creating a vertical channel in partially solidified strata and then softer material of Curtis formation filling that channel immediately. 

Apparent Sand Pipe in Goblins SP

​As already said, I claim no proof for young Earth geology just from this one subject of Sand pipes, however lack of complementary explanation from evolutionary geologists and perfect solution for their creation in Mabul Flood scenario, makes sand pipes an important issue for our view.