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Written by Boldone
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Wednesday, 26 August 2009 |
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Doing stratigraphy and paleontology in Hound Island (Lower Alexander Arch - 7 Miles S of Kake In the Keku Strait), about 1200 km north of Vancouver on the Alaskan coast, must be fun for a trained paleontologist [providing the necessary comforts during and after field work]. But digging ichthyosaurs within turbiditic successions makes it unforgettable.
This is what happend to Thomas Adams and co-workers (my guess) who have
recently published the results of an (the?) Hound Island campaign. Here
island arc vulcanoes where active during the mid Norian, in the Trias
(about 210 million years ago). Along the submarine slope of the
volcano, sudden deliveries of pyroclasts triggered gravity flows
and turbidity currents. Something similar must happen at the toe of modern
island arcs, in deltas worldwide, or wherever huge volumes of sediment are made available in water in a short time. But where
a modern turbidity current may catch something as a dolphin or whale
carcass on its way to the last burial place, during
the Norian it was ichthyosaurs, eusauropterygians and thalattosaurs around. And today much more fun to discover.
Check it all out in the new Palaios paper, September 2009 issue.
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