Hydrogeochemical and geophysical investigations to delineate underground water aquifer in arid regions: A case study, Gara oasis, Egypt

Abstract

The goal of the present study is to investigate, delineate, and evaluate the shallow Miocene groundwater aquifer with vertical and lateral facies variations in the Gara oasis, western desert of Egypt. This oasis represents a typical arid region in North Africa. Through grid texture analysis, lineament detection, edge detection, thresholding, and identifying areas of structural complexity from the filtered residual reduced-to-pole magnetic anomaly map, it is possible to outline the fracture zones that principally control the groundwater aquifers and water flow in the area. The groundwater quality and quantity are examined hydro-geochemically through nine groundwater samples that were gathered from wells and springs distributed throughout the area around Gara Lake. Measurements of physio-chemical parameters (TDS, pH, and EC) are carried out and its spatial distribution is critically studied. The results reveal that the ion-exchange process caused by water-rock interaction is the dominant process. Furthermore, the main ions in the groundwater in the study areas were Na and Cl. This might be due to evaporation or halite dissolution with the upward flow of waters through the fractures from the deep aquifer of the Nubian sandstone to the shallow aquifer of the fractured Miocene limestone.

Integrated stratigraphical, hydrogeochemical, and geophysical studies to characterize the shallow groundwater aquifers in Wadi Araba area, western Gulf of Suez, Egypt

“…Additionally, it is affordable and includes both local and regional investigations. The magnetic method has primarily been used for regional surveys in hydrocarbon exploration (Abdelazeem et al 2020(Abdelazeem et al , 2021De Smet et al 2020;Abdelrahman et al 2019;Gobashy and Al-Garni 2008;Al Garni et al 2006); engineering geophysics (Araffa et al 2021;Azeem et al 2014); groundwater exploration (Gobashy et al 2021b); mineral exploration (Gobashy et al 2022(Gobashy et al , 2021aEl-Sawy et al 2018;Abdelrahman et al 2019); and mapping geological structures and igneous intrusions (Al Garni et al 2012;Wang et al 2017); in addition, estimating sedimentary basin thickness and identifying groundwater contamination (Nazih et al 2022;Rehman et al 2019) and geologic hazard and risk assessments (Fergany et al 2014;Al Garni and Gobashy 2010) are examples of a such wide range of applications.…”

Exploring gold mineralization in altered ultramafic rocks in south Abu Marawat, Eastern Desert, Egypt

“…It is employed as an effective technique and has numerous geological uses, such as geologic mapping of potential locations with buried igneous bodies that are frequently linked with mineralization, identifying supra-basement features, and estimating the thickness of sedimentary cover 12 . Moreover, it is also the favourite for studying the tectonic structure, identification of intra-basement faults and uplifts, basin modelling, and structural geometry 13 – 16 , petroleum exploration modelling of geothermal and groundwater resources 17 – 19 , allowing the visualization of the geological structure of the upper crust, like faults, aids in the discovery of buried objects such as pipes, drums, and unexploded ordnance 20 . Furthermore, it aids in mineral exploration 13 , 16 , 18 , 21 – 30 .…”