Facies and stratigraphical analyses of glacial and interglacial sediments at Morgan Bluffs, Banks Island, Canadian Arctic Archipelago

• Published in: Boreas
• Main Authors: Lakeman, Thomas R., England, John H.
• Other Authors: Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, W. Garfield Weston Foundation, Association of Canadian Universities for Northern Studies, Canadian Circumpolar Institute, Northern Scientific Training Program, Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Canada, Polar Continental Shelf Program
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: Wiley 2014
• Subjects: Arctic; Canadian Arctic Archipelago; Dammed Lake; Morgan Bluffs; Arctic Archipelago; Banks Island; Tidewater
• Online Access: http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/bor.12069; https://api.wiley.com/onlinelibrary/tdm/v1/articles/10.1111%2Fbor.12069; https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/bor.12069

Stratigraphical exposures of both glacial and non‐glacial sediments at M organ B luffs, a >6‐km long exposure on the east coast of B anks I sland, comprise a discontinuous archive of Quaternary environmental change. A detailed facies analysis of the sediments and a new stratigraphical framework is incompatible with the many climatostratigraphical units proposed previously. Instead, three distinct intervals of sedimentation are recognized. The first records the progradation of a delta, followed by fluvial aggradation of a braided river valley perhaps ∼1 Ma. The second documents glacigenic sedimentation, including fluctuations of a tidewater glacier margin, in a marine basin more than 0.78 Ma. The third records till deposition by the NW L aurentide I ce S heet during the L ate W isconsinan, followed by the progradation of a deglacial, ice‐contact delta into an ice‐dammed lake ∼12.8 cal. ka BP . The revised stratigraphical framework adds important new terrestrial observations to a sparse and fragmentary data set of Quaternary environmental change in the C anadian A rctic. This study challenges former references and correlations to the previously proposed climatostratigraphical framework and nomenclature.