Meltwater channels and their potential for paleogeographical reconstructions

Abstract

On the islands of Severnaya Zemlya, where glacial moraines are noticeably lacking, the authors have mapped numbers of unusual channels, which carry no water at present and are unrelated to the present drainage network. They identify three categories of these channels: marginal channels along valley side‐slopes, commonly occurring in flights; channels cutting across divides; and major channels following the general regional gradient and generally at right angles to the former ice margins. They identify all three types of channels as glacial meltwater channels. The first category, they argue, represents marginal channels; the second category represents superimposed meltwater channels; and the origin of the third category is as yet unexplained. Using the distribution of the various types of channels the authors have delineated the maximum of ice cover on Severnaya Zemlya at the late Pleistocene maximum.