Climate History and Sedimentation Processes off NW Africa - Cruise No. M65 - June 11 - August 10, 2005 - Dakar (Senegal) - Las Palmas (Spain) (English)

During three legs of METEOR cruise M65 sediments and water column were investigated at the continental slope off NW-Africa between about 8°N and 28°N. The first leg (M65/1) focused on the sampling of Late Quaternary sediments off Mauretania, Senegal and Guinea to reconstruct the African climatic history and its relation to changes in ocean circulation. Geochemical and geophysical investigations will allow deciphering the early diagenetic modification of the primary sediment composition as well as the preservation of geophysical and geochemical proxy parameters. The main target of the second leg (M65/2) was to describe the sedimentation dynamics off NW-Africa and to establish semi quantitative sediment budgets in relation to climate controlled sediment supply. To this purpose the continental slope off Mauretania and Senegal was investigated with high-resolution reflection seismics and geological sampling. During the third leg (M65/3), the mobile sea floor drill rig MeBo (Meeresboden-Bohrgerät) has successfully been tested in water depths between 1000 and 1700 m on the Moroccan continental slope. The goals were to examine the handling of the drill on deck and during its deployment, to test the functionality of the drill in deep water and to check the core quality for soft and consolidated sediments. During times of drill maintenance, specimens of the cephalopod Spirula were collected with a deep towed net. These samples will be used for phylogenetic and embryological studies at the Freie Universität Berlin. The cruise was funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) and the Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung (BMBF).