Frantic days

I handed inn my second semester project last day, and things are finally starting to calm a bit down, before the exams next month. This was the second project this year, and a brief summary of them is as follows:

AG210 Quaternary history of Svalbard: I described and interpreted both the genesis and environment of a new gravel unit found within the sedimentary stratigraphy of Poolepynten on Prins Karls Forland. To do this I used both sediment description and interpretation of the mollusk fauna in which I collected shells to identify. Based on this I came to the conclution that the gravel was deposited during a high density deposit during a climate similar or warmer then today and most possible during the Eemian interglacial (130-114 000 years ago).

Location overview. note the polar bear jawbone to the left of my section. It is the world's oldest remain of a polar bear (110-130 000 years old) (Adapted from Ingolfson & Wiig (2009))

Stratigraphic log. note the gravel unit toward the bottom.

Some of the shell samples collected for the project.

AG211 Marine Geology: Using mainly swath bathymetry data I identified submarine landforms within the fjord and inner-shelf area of Wijdefjorden on North-Spitsbergen. This included measuring and interpreting the significance of the different landforms. My conclusion were that a mayor ice flow were present in Wijdefjorden during the last glaciation, that it was a surging glacier, but that it could be characterized as a "fast-flowing" ice stream due to the lack of megascale glacial lineations (MSGL).

My overview map of the study area

Ground zone wedge from the converging Woodfjorden ice stream

Crag and tail feature identified both using morphology and chirp echo sounder data.

Both projects can be downloaded as Adobe Acrobat PDF files:
- AG211 termproject (OpenDrive.com)
- AG210 termproject (OpenDrive.com