Sahara Granite (Wadi Um Adawi)

The Sahara granite is a horseshoe-shaped pluton covering about 240 km2, of which 60 km2 are covered by recent sediments of the coastal plain (Bentor and Eyal, 1987). It is emplaced amongst other, but not alkaline, granites in the southern part of the Sinai Peninsula. This is one of the Wadi um Adawi granitoids of Higazy et al. (1992). The Sahara granite comprises microcline perthite, abundant quartz, riebeckite and accessory zircon, an opaque phase and fluorite. One variety of this granite, which grades into the normal type, is distinguished by the presence of arfvedsonite and, in some samples, titanite. Six chemical analyses, with some trace element data, are given by Bentor and Eyal (1987) and further analyses are in Abu El-Leil et al. (1997).