Category: Blog

From April 14 to 19, our Postdoctoral Researcher and PhD Researcher presented the NORSEAT poster at the European Geoscience Union (EGU) General Assembly 2024 in Vienna.
Juliane Scheder presented her poster on a combined modern training set of foraminifers and ostracods from three different voes on Shetland’s largest island, Mainland. This training set serves as the foundation for a relative sea-level (RSL) transfer function, which connects the elevation of surface samples to modern microfaunal associations, providing a valuable tool for high-resolution RSL reconstructions from the Holocene record around the Shetland Islands.
Rikza Nahar presented his poster titled “Constructing an Offshore Tsunami Event Stratigraphy for the Shetland Islands.” He discussed the construction of a past tsunami deposit stratigraphy as evidenced by seismic data and sediment core samples from three embayment areas around the Shetland Islands. The presentation included plans for detailed analysis involving laboratory work and data analysis to further investigate these tsunami deposits.
According to the EGU24 website, the General Assembly had 20,979 registered attendees, with 18,388 coming to Vienna from 116 countries and 2,591 joining online from 109 countries. The event was a major success, featuring 18,896 presentations across 1,044 sessions. Notably, 57% of the abstracts were from Early Career Scientists (ECS).

On Wednesday, March 6, 2024, our esteemed PhD researcher, Rikza Nur Faqih An Nahar, showcased the Norseat Project Poster at the VLIZ Marine Science Day 2024, hosted at De Grote Post in Ostend, Belgium. The focus of Rikza’s presentation was a poster titled “Constructing an offshore tsunami event stratigraphy for the Shetland Islands.” The primary objective of the project is to meticulously identify and trace tsunami deposits offshore, comprehensively study their characteristics and extent, and ascertain whether the offshore record contains evidence of events beyond those already documented in the onshore record (specifically, the Storrega tsunami, and events approximately 5500 years and 1500 years Before Present). This pursuit aims to provide novel insights into recurrence intervals.

Already, two surveys have been conducted with the research vessel Belgica. These surveys involved the collection of high-resolution geophysical data, including multibeam bathymetry and backscatter, geoacoustic and seismic data, alongside the retrieval of several vibrocores. These activities were concentrated in three embayment areas around the Shetland Islands.

For a more detailed look at the preliminary results, we encourage you to explore the conferences and publications column on this website. (click here)

On Tuesday, March 5, 2024, our team member, Dr. Juliane Scheder, delivered a compelling presentation at the BELQUA 2024 Annual Scientific Workshop in the Rubens Room of the Royal Academies for Science and the Arts of Belgium. The project, titled “Reconstructing Holocene relative sea-level changes and extreme events in the Shetland Islands (United Kingdom),” focused on addressing the limitations of existing Raising Sea Level (RSL) data, which covers two specific time frames (ca. 7900–5990 cal BP and around 3500 cal BP) with a notable vertical error (±8 m during the well-constrained Storegga tsunami period across the islands). Dr. Scheder outlined the methodology employed, emphasizing the utilization of a combined modern training set (foraminifers and ostracods) sourced from three salt marshes and adjacent tidal flats along the coast of Shetland’s largest island, Mainland. This approach aims to establish a robust RSL transfer function, correlating the elevation of surface samples to mean sea level based on modern microfaunal associations. The presentation shed light on the project’s preliminary results, offering a promising step forward in understanding Holocene sea-level changes and extreme events in the Shetland Islands.

From September 1st to September 12th, 2023, our team conducted the second survey aboard RV Belgica. The primary goal of this survey was to obtain sediment core samples from three distinct research areas: Dury Voe, Basta Voe, and Sullom Voe. In addition to collecting core sediment samples, we also conducted geophysical data acquisition using TOPAS and MULTIBEAM systems, significantly enhancing our swath grid and coverage area compared to the previous survey. The scientific team for this second NORSEAT campaign comprised experts from various institutions, including Ghent University, Geological Survey of Belgium, University of Coimbra, University of Heidelberg, University of Koln, Flanders Marine Institute (VLIZ), and Sea Network POGO Ocean.

The first official research cruise of the NORSEAT Project started from Wednesday 30 November 2022 and ended at Friday 9 December 2022 aboard the new BELGICA II. The Shipboard scientifiv team was consisting of 12 scientists from Ghent University (RCMG, UGent), Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences, Geological Survey of Belgium (GSB), University of Dundee (UK), UCoimbra (Portugal) and University of Heidelberg (Germany).

Although we departed with a delay of ~36 ours from Zeebrugge and had to cancel two of the sites for data acquisition, we were able to gather high-quality data in three of the original study areas, with some added extra survey lines in both of them. The campaign was in general a success, in particular when considering the comparably friendly weather and wave conditions in December in the Shetland Islands. We wish to thank the crew and the captain Gaetan Motmans for their collaboration and assistance during the survey, as well as the accommodation onboard RV Belgica II.

Today, the Norseat site has been launched. Our goal with this new website is to provide information about the Noreat project and introduce you to the project participants and parties.

New announcements will be communicated via the ‘Blog’ part of the website.