Thursday, 30 August 2007 - 4:00 PM
4.P2.A-2

Coastal glacial valley system in the Wood Bay (western Ross Sea, Antarctica)

Chiara Sauli, Martina Busetti, Laura De Santis, Lorenzo Sormani, and Nigel Wardell. Istituto Nazionale Oceanografia e Geofisica Sperimentale, Borgo Grotta Gigante 42/c, Sgonico, Trieste, 34010, Italy

In the context of the reinterpretation of seismic data in the Ross Sea made for the Vilmap PNRA project, the availability of newly acquired higher resolution single channel seismic lines has allowed to investigate the Cenozoic glacial features that are present in the Wood Bay, the coastal area of the western Ross Sea between the Cape Washington and the Mariner and Borchgrevink Glaciers. The investigation focuses on the dynamics of the East Antarctic Ice Sheet, and, in particular, the local coastal glaciers that extend into the sea as ice tongues, contributing to drainage the Ice Sheet through the Transantarctic Mountains. The dynamics of these glaciers, mainly valley and outlet glaciers, the Tinker Glacier, Aviator Glacier and Parker Glacier, is shown in the investigated depositional features that include subglacial and proglacial progradational deposits, grounding zone wedges, a possible morainal bank complex, and in the erosional evidence of glacial unconformities and troughs.

[Manuscript]