Modern sediment accumulation rates and sediment transport in the monsoonal

narrow shelf setting off central Vietnam, South China Sea

WITOLD SZCZUCISKI
1
, KARL STATTEGGER
2
, JAN SCHOLTEN
3


1
Institute of Geology, Adam Mickiewicz University, Makw Polnych 16, 61-606 Pozna, Poland, (witek@amu.edu.pl)
2
Institute of Geosciences, University of Kiel, Otto-Hahn-Platz 1, D-24118 Kiel, Germany
3
Marine Environment Laboratory, 4 Quai Antoine 1er, 980000 Monaco

The central Vietnam shelf represents a narrow shelf with
a mountainous coastline and seasonal monsoon driven
sediment supply. This study examines the sedimentation
processes along two shelf transects using natural
radionuclides (
210
Pb,
137
Cs), the texture and structure of
sediments as well as their geochemical composition. The
sediments were collected with a giant box corer and a
gravity corer during cruise 140 of R/V Sonne [1]. The
investigated shore-normal shelf transects are located at
1213 N and 1500 N. The inner shelf is characterised
by sand and the middle shelf by mud accumulated during
the last century with an average
210
Pb-based accumulation
rate of 0.43 to 0.73 g cm
-2
y
-1
for the southern transect and
0.92 g cm
-2
y
-1
for the northern transect. The sediments of
the outer shelf are composed of mud which has n average
accumulation rate of 0.44 g cm
-2
y
-1
in the southern
transect, and of carbonate bioclasts sand on the northern
transect. The differences between the sediment
composition on the investigated transects may be related
to the major sediment sources, current directions and the
degree of shelf exposure to highly energetic marine
conditions. The sedimentation rates are comparable to
other narrow shelves with high seasonal sediment supply.
Sediment properties do not change down-core suggesting
that in the past century sedimentation processes and
sediment sources did not change significantly. Shelf
sediments are derived from local mountainous drainages,
contributions from Mekong or Red rivers sources could
not be detected. Recent sediment accumulation rates are
several times higher than previously reported for the
Holocene [2]. Changes in the sedimentation rates between
the last century and the last millennia are believed to be
the result of increased erosion following large-scale
deforestation of mountainous hinterland in the Recent
past [3]. The
210
Pb flux in the sediments on the middle
shelf are much higher than the expected
210
Pb flux from
atmospheric input and the inner shelf is lacking in modern
sediments [4]. This implies intense offshore sediment
transport possibly by gravity driven fluid mud flows.
Further indications of fluid mud are surface layers having
uniform
210
Pb activity and internal lamination visible in
X-ray pictures. The surface layers are several cm thick
and were found in several cores taken from the southern
transect at the end of the dry season. Significant sediment
bypass to the continental slope area is very likely. This is
indicated by fluid-mud transport across the shelf, by
deposition rates of surface layers which are several times
higher than century-averaged accumulation rates and by
high seasonal sediment delivery to the shelf.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The study was supported by German Federal Ministry of
Education and Research Grant (Grant Nos. 03G0140A
and B) and Polish Ministry of Education and Science
grants No. 6 P04D 009 21 and 2P04D 051 30.

REFERENCES
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[2] Schimanski, A. and Stattegger, K. (2005) Deglacial and
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[4] Szczuciski, W., Jagodziski, R., Nguyen Trung Thanh,
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Meyniana, 57, 117-132.









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