Components of an Antarctic trough-mouth fan: examples from the Crary Fan, Weddell Sea

Trough-mouth fans (TMFs) are large depocentres of glacially influenced sediments formed at the mouths of some glacially carved cross-shelf troughs (Vorren et al. 1989). They develop in front of ice streams grounded at, or near to, the shelf edge, which transported large volumes of glacigenic sediment to the outer shelf and upper slope. The main components of TMFs are prograding outer shelf–upper slope strata which are constructed largely of foresets comprising debris-flow units. They are commonly capped by topsets that may include subglacially deposited tills (Fig. 1f). Mass-wasting deposits, gullies and channels may also occur in conjunction with or within the TMFs.

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