Coarse clast ridge sequences as suitable archives for past storm events?: Case study on the Houtman Abrolhos, Western Australia

Prehistoric storm records are relatively scarce in most parts of the world. This article presents stormrecords derived from coral rubble-based geological archives of the Houtman Abrolhos Archipelago located off the west coast of Australia, where the southernmost coral reefs of the Indian Ocean are f...

Full description

Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Scheffers, A., Scheffers, S., Kelletat, D., Squire, P., Collins, Lindsay, Feng, Y., Zhao, J., Joannes-Boyau, R., May, S., Schellmann, G., Freeman, H.
Format: Journal Article
Published: John Wiley & Sons 2012
Subjects:
Online Access:http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/23281
_version_ 1848751106678587392
author Scheffers, A.
Scheffers, S.
Kelletat, D.
Squire, P.
Collins, Lindsay
Feng, Y.
Zhao, J.
Joannes-Boyau, R.
May, S.
Schellmann, G.
Freeman, H.
author_facet Scheffers, A.
Scheffers, S.
Kelletat, D.
Squire, P.
Collins, Lindsay
Feng, Y.
Zhao, J.
Joannes-Boyau, R.
May, S.
Schellmann, G.
Freeman, H.
author_sort Scheffers, A.
building Curtin Institutional Repository
collection Online Access
description Prehistoric storm records are relatively scarce in most parts of the world. This article presents stormrecords derived from coral rubble-based geological archives of the Houtman Abrolhos Archipelago located off the west coast of Australia, where the southernmost coral reefs of the Indian Ocean are found. Winter storm swell from the circum-Antarctic ‘Brave Westerlies’, as well as tropical cyclone waves, have left numerous ridge systems on dozens of islands of the archipelago, all composed of coral rubble from adjacent reefs. At three islands, seven ridge systems were dated by three different methods: U-series (68 dates), radiocarbon (64 dates), electron spin resonance (7 dates); 139radiometric dates span the last 5500 years of the Holocene. In contrast to the geomorphological interpretation, the age sequences show ‘inversions’, hiatuses and different ages for the same ridge, all pointing to complicated ridge formation processes. Time gaps, some exceeding 1000 years, are interpreted as phases of erosion and not as phases without storm activity.
first_indexed 2025-11-14T07:47:27Z
format Journal Article
id curtin-20.500.11937-23281
institution Curtin University Malaysia
institution_category Local University
last_indexed 2025-11-14T07:47:27Z
publishDate 2012
publisher John Wiley & Sons
recordtype eprints
repository_type Digital Repository
spelling curtin-20.500.11937-232812017-09-13T13:57:43Z Coarse clast ridge sequences as suitable archives for past storm events?: Case study on the Houtman Abrolhos, Western Australia Scheffers, A. Scheffers, S. Kelletat, D. Squire, P. Collins, Lindsay Feng, Y. Zhao, J. Joannes-Boyau, R. May, S. Schellmann, G. Freeman, H. coastal evolution palaeotempestology geomorphology beach ridges Holocene Prehistoric storm records are relatively scarce in most parts of the world. This article presents stormrecords derived from coral rubble-based geological archives of the Houtman Abrolhos Archipelago located off the west coast of Australia, where the southernmost coral reefs of the Indian Ocean are found. Winter storm swell from the circum-Antarctic ‘Brave Westerlies’, as well as tropical cyclone waves, have left numerous ridge systems on dozens of islands of the archipelago, all composed of coral rubble from adjacent reefs. At three islands, seven ridge systems were dated by three different methods: U-series (68 dates), radiocarbon (64 dates), electron spin resonance (7 dates); 139radiometric dates span the last 5500 years of the Holocene. In contrast to the geomorphological interpretation, the age sequences show ‘inversions’, hiatuses and different ages for the same ridge, all pointing to complicated ridge formation processes. Time gaps, some exceeding 1000 years, are interpreted as phases of erosion and not as phases without storm activity. 2012 Journal Article http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/23281 10.1002/jqs.2558 John Wiley & Sons restricted
spellingShingle coastal evolution
palaeotempestology
geomorphology
beach ridges
Holocene
Scheffers, A.
Scheffers, S.
Kelletat, D.
Squire, P.
Collins, Lindsay
Feng, Y.
Zhao, J.
Joannes-Boyau, R.
May, S.
Schellmann, G.
Freeman, H.
Coarse clast ridge sequences as suitable archives for past storm events?: Case study on the Houtman Abrolhos, Western Australia
title Coarse clast ridge sequences as suitable archives for past storm events?: Case study on the Houtman Abrolhos, Western Australia
title_full Coarse clast ridge sequences as suitable archives for past storm events?: Case study on the Houtman Abrolhos, Western Australia
title_fullStr Coarse clast ridge sequences as suitable archives for past storm events?: Case study on the Houtman Abrolhos, Western Australia
title_full_unstemmed Coarse clast ridge sequences as suitable archives for past storm events?: Case study on the Houtman Abrolhos, Western Australia
title_short Coarse clast ridge sequences as suitable archives for past storm events?: Case study on the Houtman Abrolhos, Western Australia
title_sort coarse clast ridge sequences as suitable archives for past storm events?: case study on the houtman abrolhos, western australia
topic coastal evolution
palaeotempestology
geomorphology
beach ridges
Holocene
url http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/23281