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The glacier-fed fan at the mouth of Storfjorden trough, western Barents Sea: a comparative study

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Abstract

The Middle and Late Pleistocene succession on the glacier-fed fan at the mouth of Storfjorden trough was studied using high-resolution seismic data. Seven glacial advances to the shelf break during Middle and Late Pleistocene resulted in episodic high sediment input to the fan with real sedimentation rates of up to 172 cm/1000 years, separated by sediment-starved interstadials and interglacials. On the upper fan the high sediment input resulted in frequent slides and slumps, generating debris flows which dominate the mid-fan strata. Compared with the larger neighbouring Bear Island trough mouth fan, the Storfjorden trough mouth fan has a steeper fan gradient, narrower, thinner and shorter debris flow deposits and lower frequency of large scale sliding. Glacier-fed submarine fans receive their main sediment input from a glacier margin at the shelf break, as opposed to river-fed fans where sediment input occurs through a channel-levee complex. As a result, the depocentre of a river-fed fan is found on the mid-fan and the upper slope is mainly an area of sediment bypass, whereas the glacier-fed fan has an elongated depocentre across the uppermost fan. The river-fed fans are dominated by deposition from turbidity currents, whereas glacier-fed fans are dominated by debris flow deposits.

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  1. Institute of Biology and Geology, University of Tromsø, N-9037, Tromsø, Norway

    J. S. Laberg & T. O. Vorren

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  1. J. S. Laberg
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  2. T. O. Vorren
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Laberg, J.S., Vorren, T.O. The glacier-fed fan at the mouth of Storfjorden trough, western Barents Sea: a comparative study. Geol Rundsch 85, 338–349 (1996). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02422239

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02422239

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