Morphological characterization of submarine slope failures in a semi-enclosed fjord, Frobisher Bay, eastern Canadian Arctic
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Published:September 30, 2019
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CiteCitation
Robert Deering, Trevor Bell, Donald L. Forbes, Calvin Campbell, Evan Edinger, 2019. "Morphological characterization of submarine slope failures in a semi-enclosed fjord, Frobisher Bay, eastern Canadian Arctic", Subaqueous Mass Movements and their Consequences: Assessing Geohazards, Environmental Implications and Economic Significance of Subaqueous Landslides, D.G. Lintern, D.C. Mosher, L.G. Moscardelli, P.T. Bobrowsky, C. Campbell, J. Chaytor, J. Clague, A. Georgiopoulou, P. Lajeunesse, A. Normandeau, D. Piper, M. Scherwath, C. Stacey, D. Turmel
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Abstract
Submarine slope failures in the nearshore waters of SE Baffin Island, eastern Canadian Arctic, present a challenge to coastal and seabed development. Submarine slope failures are a known geohazard in fjords in Norway, Chile, Alaska, British Columbia and elsewhere, but have received little attention in the coastal waters of Arctic Canada. Over the past 6 years, there has been a rapid expansion of multibeam echosounder (MBES) mapping in Canadian Arctic fjords, leading to the discovery of many submarine slope failures. One area that has been mapped in detail is inner Frobisher Bay. This macrotidal, seasonally ice-covered, semi-enclosed embayment has a glacially scoured bed, ice-contact deposits, including recessional moraines, and stratified glaciomarine and post-glacial silts and clays with abundant dropstones. The prevalence of submarine slope failures in the inner bay (one per 20 km2) appears to be anomalous. To date, MBES mapping has imaged at least 246 failures, ranging in size from 0.007 to 2.1 km2 and all within the glaciomarine and post-glacial succession. Morphometric analysis of these features based on high-resolution MBES bathymetry provides an insight into their spatial distribution, relative chronology, triggers and flow characteristics; factors essential to understanding the mechanisms underlying their abundance in this Canadian Arctic fjord.
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Contents
Subaqueous Mass Movements and their Consequences: Assessing Geohazards, Environmental Implications and Economic Significance of Subaqueous Landslides
CONTAINS OPEN ACCESS
The challenges facing submarine mass movement researchers and engineers are plentiful and exciting. This book follows several high-profile submarine landslide disasters that have reached the world's attention over the past few years. For decades, researchers have been mapping the world's mass movements. Their significant impacts on the Earth by distributing sediment on phenomenal scales is undeniable. Their importance in the origins of buried resources has long been understood. Their hazard potential ranges from damaging to apocalyptic, frequently damaging local infrastructure and sometimes devastating whole coastlines. Moving beyond mapping advances, the subaqueous mass movement scientists and practitioners are now also focussed on assessing the consequences of mass movements, and the measurement and modelling of events, hazard analysis and mitigation. Many state-of-the-art examples are provided in this book, which is produced under the auspices of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation Program S4SLIDE (Significance of Modern and Ancient Submarine Slope LandSLIDEs).