Age determination of sediment cores from the western Svalbard margin ...

• Main Authors: Svendsen, John Inge, Elverhoi, Anders, Mangerud, Jan
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: PANGAEA 1996
• Subjects: Piston corer; Gravity corer; QUEEN_Exped; Quaternary Environment of the Eurasian North QUEEN; Barents Sea; Billefjorden; Ice Sheet; Isfjord*; Isfjorden; Sea ice; Svalbard; Svalbard margin; Spitsbergen
• Online Access: https://dx.doi.org/10.1594/pangaea.732368; https://doi.pangaea.de/10.1594/PANGAEA.732368

The deglaciation of the continental shelf to the west of Spitsbergen and the main fjord, Isfjorden, is discussed based on sub-bottom seismic records and sediment cores. The sea floor on the shelf to the west of Isfjorden is underlain by less than 2 m of glaciomarine sediments over a firm diamicton interpreted as till. In central Isfjorden up to 10 m of deglaciation sediments were recorded, whereas in cores from the innermost tributary, Billefjorden, less than a meter of ice proximal sediments was recognized between the till and the 'normal' Holocene marine sediments. We conclude that the Barents Sea Ice Sheet terminated along the shelf break during the Late Weichselian glacial maximum. Radiocarbon dates from the glaciomarine sediments above the till indicate a stepwise deglaciation. Apparently the ice front retreated from the outermost shelf around 14.8 ka. A dramatic increase in the flux of line-grained glaciomarine sediments around 13 ka is assumed to reflect increased melting and/or current activity due ... : further relevant datasets see Svendsen et al. (1992) dataset: doi:10.1594/PANGAEA.732390 and Elverhoi et al. (1995) dataset: doi:10.1594/PANGAEA.707941 ...