RRS "Charles Darwin" Cruise CD166, 29 Oct - 22 Nov 2004. Sedimentary processes and deposits in the Agadir Basin and Gulf of Cadiz

Abstract

The primary aim of CD166 was to undertake intensive coring in the Agadir Basin on the Northwest African margin, with the intention of characterising deep-water gravity flow processes and deposits at a basin-wide scale. In addition, it was hoped that sampling of volcaniclastic turbidites derived from Canary Islands landslides would provide insights into landslide processes and aid assessment of potential tsunami hazards. In addition, the first two days of the cruise were assigned to piston coring of a small, deep-water sand lobe in the Gulf of Cadiz, off southern Spain.

In the event, CD166 proved to be a highly successful cruise. In the Agadir work area a total of 50 piston cores was collected, up to 8 m in length. Most of the cores successfully penetrated through the target turbidite units 1-14, providing sedimentological and stratigraphical data for the last 200,000 years. The piston coring mechanism was extremely reliable throughout this extensive coring effort. In the Speculobe work area, a total of 11 piston cores was collected, up to 7.7 m in length. The seabed environment in this region was highly challenging for coring, although several of the cores did recover crucial sediment sequences. The insights gained from these two datasets are likely to substantially alter current thinking on large-scale deep-water gravity flows.

Wildlife observations were dominated by a variety of disoriented migrant landbirds and even a Migratory Locust arrived on board. Of scientific interest was the unusually large number of Leach’s Storm-petrels Oceanodroma leucorhoa recovered on the deck of the ship at night.

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