Evidence for an extensive ice shelf in northern Baffin Bay during the Last Glacial Maximum

• Published in: Communications Earth & Environment
• Main Authors: Couette, Pierre-Olivier, Lajeunesse, Patrick, Ghienne, Jean-François, Dorschel, Boris, Gebhardt, Catalina, Hebbeln, Dierk, Brouard, Etienne
• Other Authors: Université Laval Québec (ULaval), Institut Terre Environnement Strasbourg (ITES), École Nationale du Génie de l'Eau et de l'Environnement de Strasbourg (ENGEES)-Université de Strasbourg (UNISTRA)-Institut national des sciences de l'Univers (INSU - CNRS)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research (AWI), Center for Marine Environmental Sciences Bremen (MARUM), Universität Bremen, Centre de recherche sur la dynamique du système Terre (GEOTOP), École Polytechnique de Montréal (EPM)-McGill University = Université McGill Montréal, Canada -Université de Montréal (UdeM)-Université du Québec en Abitibi-Témiscamingue (UQAT)-Université du Québec à Rimouski (UQAR)-Concordia University Montreal -Université du Québec à Montréal = University of Québec in Montréal (UQAM)
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: HAL CCSD 2022
• Subjects: [SDU.STU.GL]Sciences of the Universe [physics]/Earth Sciences/Glaciology; [SDU.STU.ST]Sciences of the Universe [physics]/Earth Sciences/Stratigraphy; [SDU.STU.CL]Sciences of the Universe [physics]/Earth Sciences/Climatology; Arctic; Baffin Bay; Baffin Island; Greenland; Antarc*; Antarctica; Baffin; Ice Shelf; Ice Shelves
• Online Access: https://hal.science/hal-03806443; https://hal.science/hal-03806443/document; https://hal.science/hal-03806443/file/CouetteEtAl_2022_HAL_Evidence%20for%20an%20extensive%20ice%20shelf%20in%20northern%20Baffin%20Bay%20during%20the%20Last%20Glacial%20Maximum-1.pdf; https://doi.org/10.1038/s43247-022-00559-7

International audience The glaciological significance of ice shelves is relatively well established for the stability of modern ice sheets of Antarctica. Past ice shelves of the Arctic, however, are poorly documented while their role for the stability of former ice sheets remains mostly unknown. Here we present swath bathymetry data and seismostratigraphic profiles that reveal a large moraine system extending along the continental slope off Baffin Island, demonstrating that a 500-m thick ice shelf covered northern Baffin Bay during the last glacial episode. We suggest that this ice shelf had a profound impact on the stability of a series of major ice streams that drained the interior of the Laurentide, Innuitian and Greenland ice sheets. Climate warming and global sea-level rise in the early stage of deglaciation possibly contributed to a large-scale break-up of the ice shelf, which led to the destabilisation and reorganisation of tributary ice streams from these three ice sheets.