Submarine debris flows and continental slople evolution in front of Quaternary ice sheets, Baffin Bay, Canadian Arctic
- Memorial Univ. of Newfoundland, St. John's (Canada)
Baffin Bay is a semi-enclosed extension of the Labrador Sea in the Canadian Arctic. The upper Pliocene and Quaternary successions beneath the continental slope contain important slumps and debris-flow deposits. New high-resolution single-channel seismic data have been acquired from a 500 to 600-m-deep transverse trough that indents that shelf in an area where glacial outflow was focused during the Pliocene and Pleistocene. Major shelf-edge progradation occurred both inside and on the flanks of the transverse trough. In the lower slope, several large debris flows carried proglacial deposits into the deep basin. The largest of these debris flows dramatically reshaped the sea floor by reducing bottom slopes both by proximal erosion and distal thickening of the debris-flow deposit. Subsequently, the lower slope was starved of terrigenous input, and the upper slope was steepened by accumulation of basinward thinning wedges of mass flow deposits. The processes of emplacement of large debris flows, slope reshaping, and out-of-phase accumulation identified in upper and lower slope areas of Baffin Bay are relevant to the interpretation of other line-source margins affected by major sea level falls or changes in sediment influx, including siliciclastic slope aprons and carbonate platform margins. On fans, muddy debris flows provide both a potential seal for hydrocarbons generated after burial and a potentially important mass of organic-rich mudstones that may act as source rocks in the subsurface. 32 refs., 14 figs., 1 tab.
- OSTI ID:
- 6833245
- Journal Information:
- AAPG Bulletin (American Association of Petroleum Geologists); (United States), Vol. 78:3; ISSN 0149-1423
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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Related Subjects
CANADA
ARCTIC REGIONS
CONTINENTAL SLOPE
EROSION
GEOLOGIC DEPOSITS
SEDIMENTATION
ORGANIC MATTER
DEPOSITION
HYDROCARBONS
QUATERNARY PERIOD
RESERVOIR ROCK
SEA LEVEL
SEALS
SEDIMENTARY BASINS
SEDIMENTARY ROCKS
SEISMIC WAVES
SLOPE STABILITY
SOURCE ROCKS
CENOZOIC ERA
CONTINENTAL MARGIN
CRYOSPHERE
DEVELOPED COUNTRIES
GEOLOGIC AGES
GEOLOGIC STRUCTURES
LEVELS
MATTER
NORTH AMERICA
ORGANIC COMPOUNDS
POLAR REGIONS
ROCKS
STABILITY
020200* - Petroleum- Reserves
Geology
& Exploration