Cleal, C.J. & Thomas, B.A. 1996 British Upper Carboniferous Stratigraphy. Geological Conservation Review Series No. 11, JNCC, Peterborough, ISBN 0 412 72780 3.
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Shipload Bay shows a well exposed sequence of the Bude Formation, and includes a variety of sedimentary structures indicating that sedimentation occurred in relatively shallow water.
Coastal exposures about 2 km east of Hartland Point, Devon
The lithologies exposed here are dominated by thin- and medium-bedded sandstones with siltstones and shales. However, there is also a thicker sandstone unit exposed high in the cliff, more typical of Bude Formation sequences seen elsewhere. A prominent slumped interval of sandstone slabs in a dark, homogeneous mudstone matrix can be traced along strike for c.3 km, and probably represents a flow of liquefied mud coursing down underwater slopes, incorporating semi-consolidated sediment as it progressed. Sedimentary structures are particularly well exposed here, including flute and load casts, ripple marks, flame structures, mudflakes, and occasional fine-grained sandstones with cross- and wedge-bedding.
The sedimentary structures preserved here indicate strongly that sedimentation of the Bude Formation was in relatively shallow water, in a deltaic or lacustrine setting.
Shipload Bay shows particularly well exposed examples of sedimentary structures in rocks known as the Bude Formation, about 312 million years old. They provide evidence that these beds were formed in a shallow marine setting, and represent the last phases of the infilling of the area of sea known as the Culm Trough, that extended from Ireland and southwest Britain to northern Germany.