Paper submitted to IMAGE 2026, by Eric Frugier, Hao Xing, Gan Yu, Jeff Tilton, Taylor Buckley, Matheus Pila, Trong Tang, Matthew Plummer, Darrell Armentrout, Khaled Abdelaziz, Aurora Rodriguez-Castelan (TGS).
Abstract
Deeper post-salt and pre-salt plays in the Lower Congo Basin offshore Angola remain mostly underexplored due to complex salt bodies that hinder seismic illumination and velocity model building. In 2025, TGS acquired an 8,681 km2 3D survey over Blocks 33, 49, and 50 using a hybrid narrow-azimuth and one-sided wide-azimuth acquisition layout along with low-frequency sources. The added orthogonal azimuth content improved illumination around salt overhangs and steep flanks while preserving acquisition efficiency appropriate for an exploration-stage program. To turn these acquisition advantages into a reliable earth model, using both NAZ and WAZ data, we used an elastic dynamic matching FWI (E-DMFWI) workflow with iterative salt interpretation and geological QC. Elastic modeling captured angle-dependent behavior across strong contrasts while well-based calibration ensured geological consistent. This integrated acquisition and inversion approach provided a cost-efficient pathway to high-resolution imaging in Angola’s frontier salt provinces and supports earlier, lower risk prospect evaluation where legacy 3D data are lacking.
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