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Paleo-Fluid Expulsion Influencing Contouritic Drift Formation on the Chatham Rise, New Zealand

The Chatham Rise is located offshore of New Zealand’s South Island. Vast areas of the Chatham Rise are covered in circular to elliptical seafloor depressions that appear to be forming through a bathymetrically controlled mechanism, as seafloor depressions 2–5 km in diameter are found in water depths of 800–1100 m. High-resolution P-Cable 3D seismic data were acquired in 2013 across one of these depressions. The seafloor depression is interpreted as a mounded contourite. Our data reveal several smaller buried depressions (<20-650 m diameter) beneath the mounded contourite that we interpret as paleo-pockmarks.

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