CEL E B R A T I N G

YEARS

. . . taking scientific ocean drilling into the next millenium . . .1999 Calendar

of Scientific Ocean Drilling

303300EDITORS

Jack BalduafThomas Davies

Paul J. FoxAaron H. Woods

PRODUCTION EDITORLaura Arvin

GRAPHIC DESIGNKaren E. WagnerDebbie Partain

PHOTO EDITORJohn Beck

SPECIAL CONTRIBUTIONSGerald BodeEarl E. DavisC.R. DomackE.W. DomackJames KennettBruce Malfait

Arthur MaxwellArchie McLerran

D. Jay MillerCharles K. PaullTom Pettigrew

Maureen RaymoEric SchultePaul Wallace

30J A N U A R Y 1 9 9 9

The Glomar ChallengerThe Glomar ChallengerGlomar Challenger carried the time-honored and

respected name of the world’s first dedicated full time

oceanographic research vessel, Her Majesty’s Ship

Challenger. The work of the H.M.S. Challenger laid a

firm foundation for the science of oceanography when

she departed Portsmouth, England in December 1872

and ultimately visited all oceans traveling 68,000 miles.

Global Marine Inc. built and operated the Glomar

Challenger specifically for the Deep Sea Drilling Project,

with construction completed in June 1968 at the

Livingston Shipbuilding Yards in Orange, Texas. Glomar

Challenger was the largest commercial vessel to be

equipped with dynamic positioning technology using

four thrusters located in the bow and stern. She also

deployed, what was at the time, the longest drill string

ever to be suspended from a ship or floating platform.

Glomar Challenger was also one of the first non-military

vessels to use the once classified satellite navigation sys-

tem developed by the U.S. Navy. This technology, now

commonly referred to as Global Positioning System,

helped determine a ship’s position with a high degree of

accuracy and consistency.

The beginning . . .The Joint Oceanographic Institutions for Deep Earth Sampling (JOIDES) program was formally established in May 1964 by four major oceanographic institutions which had strong

interests and programs in the fields of marine geology and geophysics: Institute of Marine Science, University of Miami; Lamont Geological Observatory (now named Lamont-

Doherty Earth Observatory) of Columbia University; Scripps Institution of Oceanography; and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. The purpose of JOIDES was to join these

organizations in a cooperative effort to promote the investigation and laboratory examination of core samples taken from beneath the ocean floor.

On June 24, 1966, Scripps received a $12.6 million con-

tract from the National Science Foundation to fund the

18-month Deep Sea Drilling Project (DSDP). Such was

the success of DSDP that the program was repeatedly

extended. In announcing the first extension, in October

1969, Dr. William D. McElroy, director of the NSF, said:

Dr. William A. Nierenberg, director of Scripps and

Principal Investigator for DSDP, assembled a team of

renowned scientists and technicians to manage the sci-

entific operations of the project. Nierenberg’s first

responsibility was to locate a vessel capable of accom-

plishing this mission. Global Marine Inc. was able to

respond with the drill ship Glomar Challenger.

“The Deep Sea Drilling Project, producing a growing vol-

ume of information vital to our understanding of this

dynamically changing earth and its history, has proven to

be an outstanding scientific and technological success. It

has excited not only the more than 300 scientists of the

country who have been involved in the project’s planning

and execution, but many others throughout the United

States and abroad who are following the progress of this

national program. Undoubtedly in years to come

research on the core materials will contribute to the

interest and enthusiasm of graduate students, bringing

many more into this field of work. The continuance of

this project will contribute significantly to the world’s

scientific knowledge.”

Specifications:

120 meters in length

Displacement of 10,500 tons

Derrick-43 meters

Maximum of 90-day sea operations without supply replenishment

Maximum speed of 12 knots

Carries 702,000 gallons of diesel fuel 6,970 meters of drill pipe

J A N U A R YSunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday

1 2

3 4 5 6 8 9

10 11 12 15 16

17 18 22 23

7

24 25 26 27 28 29 30

19 20

13 14

21

31

New Year’s Day

Martin Luther King,Jr.’s Birthday (USA)(Observed)

Epiphany

Coming of Age Day(Japan)

Australia Day

Source: DSDP Archives

Source: DSDP Archives

30F E B R U A R Y 1 9 9 9

At 5:30 a.m. on 28 July, 1968, the Glomar Challenger sailed from the shipyards in Orange, Texas, for seatrials in the

Gulf of Mexico and eventually the first – and historic – expedition of the Deep Sea Drilling Project. Co-Chief

Scientists Maurice Ewing and J. Lamar Worzel led a group of 22 scientists, engineers and technicians on DSDP Leg 1

to investigate the Challenger Knolls in the Gulf. Scientists wanted to prove the Knolls were salt domes.

Drilling at the second site on Leg 1 began on 19 August in 3,526 meters of water, some 640 kilometers southwest of

New Orleans, into the cap of a knoll. The drill bit stopped to take a core after penetrating 135 meters below the

seafloor. The entire crew assembled around the rigfloor, anticipating the core’s arrival. As would occur many times

aboard the Challenger, the scientists recieved an unexpected surprise when the core sample contained traces of oil

and gas.

The final core from this site, taken at 138-140 meters below the seafloor, was a typical section of salt dome cap, con-

sisting of anhydrite, limestone, sulfur and gypsum. Core analysis showed a sedimentary section that ranges from the

Pleistocene through the Pliocene and terminates in Miocene caprock.

Melvin Peterson, DSDP chief scientist, was quoted in the 26 August issue of the San Diego Evening Tribune as saying

“...it may be the first sniff of a very important petroleum province.”

According to the article, Peterson said the finding of the oil trace was almost accidental, because drilling was aimed

at the top of the cap, the least likely place to find oil. The discovery was the first time any direct evidence of oil was

found in ocean depths deeper than the continental shelves. Today, industry is now exploring for energy resources in

depths greater than 3,000 meters.

Maurice Ewing (left), director of Lamont Geological Observatory, (now

named Lamont Doherty Earth Observatory) J. Lamar Worzel, assistant

director of LGO, and James T. Dean, Leg 1 operations manager, display

the oil-bearing core retrieved from the Challenger Knoll in the Gulf of

Mexico during the first expedition of DSDP.

F E B R U A R YSunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday

1 2 3 4 5 6

7 8 9 10 12 13

14 15 16 19 20

21 22 26 27

11

28

23 24

17 18

25Orthodox LentBegins

St. Valentine’s Day President’s Day(USA)

Ash Wednesday

National FoundationDay (Japan)

Waitangi Day(New Zealand)

New Year - Rabbit-(Chinese Lunar)

The First Expedition

The First Expedition

Source: DSDP Archives

Source: DSDP Volume 1, (Leg1)

3030M A R C H 1 9 9 9

Trench

Continent

Oceanic Ridge

Lithosphere

Continent

MANTLE

ASTHENOSPHERE

M A R C H 1 9 9 9

Continental Drift and Plate TectonicsContinental Drift and Plate TectonicsSource: ODP

Source: DSDP Volume 3

In 1930, German scientist Alfred Wegener died on the Greenland ice cap collecting ice cores to prove his theory of continental drift. Wegener was the first prominent scientist to assemble

comprehensive evidence to suggest that the continents moved in relation to each other. Wegener’s hypothesis was rejected by much of the scientific community and Wegener dedicated –

and ultimately sacrificed – his life to disproving his detractors. Almost 40 years later, Wegener would be vindicated by the science team aboard the Glomar Challenger on DSDP Leg 3.

Expedition leaders Arthur Maxwell and Richard von Herzen, both of Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, set out on December 1, 1968 for the Sierra Leone Rise, Mid-Atlantic Ridge and Rio Grande Rise located between Dakar, Senegal,

and Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Drilling 17 holes at 10 sites, the scientists made the most significant discovery in the history of scientific ocean drilling and helped evolve our understanding of Earth’s processes.

The cores showed that the age of Earth’s crust beneath the sediments increases systematically with distance from the mid-ocean ridge crest, as predicted by the concept of sea floor spreading, i.e. crust is continuously created at the mid

ocean ridges. In the case of the South Atlantic, spreading proceeds at about 2 cm/yr. Further, the ages of core samples from immediately above crustal basement rocks were shown to correlate closely with those predicted by geophysicists

using paleomagnetic records, thus validating the paleomagnetic timescale and giving geophysicists a powerful tool for estimating the age of the ocean floor.

Plot of age of sediment immediatley

above basement as a function of near-

est distance to Ridge axis.

Added to this, following subsequent months of drilling,

came the recognition that the rocks of the ocean floor

are much younger than rocks found on the continents,

indeed drilling has yet to sample rocks older than 200

my in the deep oceans. These observations lead to

rapid acceptance of plate tectonics as the mechanism

for continental drift. For the first time, Earth scientists

had a paradigm linking many hitherto disconnected

observations in a comprehensive model of Earth

processes.

M A R C HSunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday

1 2 3 4 5 6

7 8 9 10 12 13

14 15 16 19 20

21 22 26 27

11

28 29 30 31

23 24

17 18

25

Palm Sunday

St. Patrick’s Day(Ireland, USA)

St. Joseph’s Day(Spain)

Mothering Sunday(UK)

Canberra Day(Australia)

The Mediterranean was a desert...

30A P R I L 1 9 9 9

Results from DSDP Leg 13 led to the startling hypothesis that five and a half million years ago, the Mediterranean

Sea was a desert! Although at first reluctant to accept such a conclusion, Earth scientists have come to accept that

this is the only plausible explanation for the extraordinary finding of evaporite (gypsum and halite) beds among oth-

erwise typical deep sea deposits.

Co-chief scientists were William B.F. Ryan of Lamont Geological Observatory and Kenneth J. Hsu of the Swiss

Federal Institute of Technology of Zurich. Hsu describes their voyage of discovery in his book, The Mediterranean

Was A Desert, A Voyage Of The Glomar Challenger.

“Bill Ryan and I had stayed up all night again. We were both very tired, not having had a good night’s sleep since

we left Lisbon ten days earlier. It was the morning of 24 August, 1970, and the Glomar Challenger was positioned

180 kilometers off the Barcelona coast. Ryan was discouraged. He had invested some ten years of his professional

life in studying the Mediterranean seabed with all manner of sophisticated geophysical gadgets. He knew that there

was some very strange rock down there, reflecting back all acoustic signals sent down.”

“The night before, when we had finally thought we were right on top of our target horizon, the drill pipe had gotten

stuck in the hole. When at last they raised the core barrel, they called me, but we could find nothing in it except

sands and gravels.”

“The coarser grains...measured some five to seven millimeters across. The shiney crystals were gypsum, a sulphate of

calcium and an evaporate mineral, so called because it is an evaporative residue of seawater. Gypsum occurs today

in muddy sediments (in lagoons) on arid coasts,...but no one would expect to find gypsum in a deep-sea core...”

“We found a strange association of erosional debris: in addition to the gypsum, we could identify three other compo-

nents that are rarely found in any gravel deposit, namely oceanic basalts, hardened oceanic oozes, and an unusual

fauna of very tiny shells. All the debris seemed to have been derived from a seabed – more particularly, a desiccated

seabed.”

“Our borehole had been spudded in 2,000 meters of water, however, and there could be no lagoon at such a depth

unless the Mediterranean had once lost much of its water. Was it possible, then, that the Mediterranean had once

been isolated from the Atlantic and had been changed into a desert?”

A P R I LSunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday

1 2 3

4 5 6 7 9 10

11 12 13 16 17

18 19 23 24

8

25 26 27 28 29 30

20 21

14 15

22

Good FridayFirst Day ofPassover

Easter Sunday/Daylight SavingTime begins (USA)

Orthodox Easter

Anzac Day (Australia & New Zealand)Liberation Day (Italy)Portugal’s Day (Portugal)

Green Day (Japan) Queen’s Birthday(Netherlands)

The Mediterranean was a desert...

-- Hsu, Kenneth J., The Mediterranean Was a Desert. Copyright © 1983 by

Princeton University Press. Reprinted by permission of Princeton University PressSource: DSDP Archives

30M A Y 1 9 9 9

M A YSunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday

1

2 3 4 5 7 8

9 10 11 14 15

16 17 21 22

6

23 24 25 26 27 28 29

18 19

12 13

20

Mother’s Day(USA & Canada)

30 31

Armed Forces Day(USA)

Victoria Day(Canada)

Memorial Day(USA) Observed

Labor Day (France,Germany, Italy,Portugal & Spain)

May Day (UK)Constitution Day(Japan)

Cinco De Mayo(Mexico)Children’s Day(Japan)

Liberation Day(France)

Constitution Day(Norway)

Scientific ocean drilling has always depended on exsisting drilling technology,

while pushing that technology to its limits. Two innovations introduced by DSDP

were deep water re-entry and hydraulic piston coring.

0°

30°

60°

30°

60°

0°30°60°90°120°150° 30° 90° 120° 150°60°

75°

75° DSDPRe-entry Holes

EN

S

Tec

hn

olo

gica

l In

no

vati

on

s

A. Disturbed Section (98-107 meters sub-bottom)

shows uniform, moderate olive brown, muddy diatoma-

ceous ooze with a few pale olive streaks. Core surface

shows numerous gas pockets and gas exsolution tex-

tures.

B. HPC Section (95-99 sub-bottom) shows rythmic,

mm-scale, varve-like alterations of moderate olive

brown muddy diatomaceous ooze and pale olive

diatom ooze. A gray sand layer abuts discordantly

against the varves with a sharp contact, but shows no

grading.

Deep water re-entry At many drill sites chert or other hard rocks resulted in dulling of the drill bit before

deeper objectives were achieved. The challenge was to find a way to relocate the drill hole after the drill string was

withdrawn to replace the bit. The solution was to place a re-entry funnel on the ocean floor, in the top of the drill

hole. High resolution scanning sonar could then be used to locate the funnel and guide the drill string over it. The

first operational re-entry was achieved by DSDP on Christmas Day, 1970, during Leg 15 in the Caribbean Sea.

Hydraulic Piston Coring (HPC) In soft sediment conventional rotary coring results in substantial dis-

turbance of the cores. The solution to this problem was to be found in the hydraulic piston coring, a technique which

combines aspects of both conventional drilling and piston coring, which has been used by marine geologists for

decades. Fundamentally, the hydraulic pressure found at great depths is used to drive the core barrel ahead of the

drill bit into the soft sediment. The result is an almost undisturbed core in which the smallest stratigraphic details are

preserved. This has opened the way for major advances in high resolution stratigraphic studies.

DSD

PD

SDP

Tec

hn

olo

gica

l In

no

vati

on

s

A. B.

Source: DSDP Archives

Source: ODP

Source: ODP

Source: ODP

30J U N E 1 9 9 9

The drilling vessel chartered by the Ocean Drilling

Program was built in 1978 in Halifax, Nova Scotia, as a

conventional oil-drilling ship. Then named Sedco/BP

471 and owned by SEDCO/Forex in partnership with

British Petroleum, she was refitted in Pascagoula,

Mississippi, during the Fall of 1984 to accommodate the

laboratory stack’s seven levels and other scientific facil-

ities and equipment necessary for carrying out the

Program’s objectives. Thus, she is probably the best

equipped vessel in the world for conducting scientific

research in marine geology.

When drilling operations began in January 1985, the

ship was informally christened JOIDES Resolution after

Captain James Cook’s flagship of two centuries ago,

HMS Resolution. She now officially carries the name

JOIDES Resolution.

J U N ESunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday

1 2 3 4 5

6 7 8 9 11 12

13 14 15 18 19

20 21 25 26

10

27 28 29 30

22 23

16 17

24Father’s Day (USA,Canada & UK)

Bank Holiday(Ireland)

Day of Portugal(Portugal)

Flag Day (USA)

St. Jean (Québec)

Constitution Day(Sweden)

Independence Day(Iceland)

Constitution Day(Denmark)

Measuring 144 meters long and 21 meters wide, her der-

rick rises 64 meters above the waterline. The ship main-

tains location, even in heavy seas, by means of 12 com-

puter-controlled thrusters, which are part of her dynam-

ic-positioning system. She can drill in water depths to

8,230 meters and handle as much as 9,144 meters of

drill pipe. Contrary to standard petroleum practice, cor-

ing is done in riserless mode; therefore, extreme caution

is exercised at all times in avoiding significant hydrocar-

bon accumulations.

The ship’s laboratories, from top to bottom, include

those for downhole measurements; core handling, sam-

pling and description, physical properties, paleomagnet-

ism; paleontology, thin section preparation, X-ray analy-

sis; and photography. Refrigerated cores are stored in the

lower two levels. An underway-geophysics lab is housed

on the poop deck, beneath the helipad.

A T

urn

ing As DSDP matured into a solid geoscience initiative, the international science community took notice. Japan, Germany, France and the United Kingdom became partners with the

United States and gave birth to the International Phase of Ocean Drilling. In November 1983 the aging Glomar Challenger drilled her last hole for DSDP and was retired from

service, to be replaced by a more capable ship, JOIDES Resolution. At the same time the Ocean Drilling Program (ODP) came into exsistence. Through the National Science

Foundation, the U.S. continues to lead an international partnership of 22 countries. ODP is managed by Joint Oceanographic Institutions Inc., with Texas A&M University as sci-

ence operator and Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory as the downhole logging and data bank contractor. It was a significant turning point for advancing scientific ocean drilling.

Point...

JOIDES ResolutionSource: ODP

30J U L Y 1 9 9 9

Pressure Core Sampler (PCS)Operating Schematic

CORINGAHEAD

SAMPLE CHAMBERCLOSED

BALL COLLET

ACTUATIONBALL

CORE TUBEBEARINGS

PRESSURIZEDCORE SAMPLE(1.65" DIA. X 34" LONG,

10,000 PSI WORKING PRESSURE)

BALL VALVE

PILOT BITCIRCULATIONJETS

CORE CATCHERS

NON-ROTATINGCORE TUBE

LANDINGSHOULDER

From the early days of the DSDP, the study of massive fields of methane hydrates trapped in rock and sediment

beneath the world’s oceans have captured the attention of scientists and industry officials because of the potential

global environmental impact and future energy resource. The natural gas is stored in submarine sediments as gas

hydrates, an ice-like deposit of crystallized methane and water that forms under high pressures and frigid tempera-

tures in the deep sea.

During Leg 11, Tertiary sediments recovered from Sites 102, 103, 104, and 106 consisted of dark gray hemipelagic

muds, rich in natural gas. The presence of gas in these sediments helped Leg 11 co-chief scientists Yves Lancelot

and John Ewing formulate the theory that high concentrations of free gas were stored in underlying sediments.

Charles K. Paull, University of North Carolina, and Ryo Matsumoto, University of Tokyo, were co-chief scientists for

ODP Leg 164 that drilled into Blake Ridge investigating the presence of gas hydrates. As anticipated, recovery of

gas hydrates proved difficult. Cores of sediment that were recovered by drilling released large amounts of gas, but

gas hydrates usually were not observed in the cores. Geochemical data indicated that most gas hydrates decom-

posed before the sediment cores arrived on the ship's deck. However, solid zones of gas hydrates were recovered

in horizons that were up to 30 cm thick. To deal with the ephemeral nature of gas hydrates under surface condi-

tions, scientists and technicians made use of downhole sampling and measurement tools to characterize the nature

of these deposits. Of special interest was a coring system that sealed sediments from these great depths into a

strong metal chamber and brought them back to the surface under their original pressures. These samples revealed

sediments containing more than 20 times their volume in gas when allowed to expand out of the pressure chamber

in the ship's laboratory.

Data obtained from these boreholes indicate that the sediments in this region contain significant quantities of gas

hydrates. Beneath a 200 meter thick layer of hydrate-bearing sediments, gaseous methane is also present. Since

geophysical data indicate that similar volumes of gas hydrates occur throughout large regions off the U.S. southeast

coast, the total amount of methane stored in gas hydrates is enormous. Moreover, other data indicate gas hydrates

are common in many other places in the world. Thus, preliminary estimates signify that gas hydrates, while diffi-

cult to capture, are in fact a common phase in seafloor sediments.

J U L YSunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday

1 2 3

4 5 6 7 9 10

11 12 13 16 17

18 19 23 24

8

25 26 27 28 29 30 31

20 21

14 15

22

Canada Day(Canada)

Independence Day(USA)

Bastille Day(France)

St. James (Spain)

Photographs of gas hydrate samples showing, from top

to bottom, a nearly pure piece of gas hydrate (5 cm by

14 cm in size) coated with a slurry of mud-rich

sediment; thin plates of gas hydrate, only a few

millimeters thick, that formed in vertical fractures in

sediment; and two close-up photos showing pieces of

gas hydrate (white).

34°

32°

30°

28°N

78° 76° 74°W80°82°

991, 992, 993

994, 995, 997

996

BSR

Blake Plateau

100

500

1000

2000

3000

4000

5000

CHARLESTON

SAVANNAH

Caro

lina

Rise

Blake RidgeGas

Hy

dra

tes

Res

earc

hG

as H

yd

rate

s R

esea

rch

Source: ODP

Source: ODP

Source: ODP

Source: ODP

Source: ODP

Source: ODP

30A U G U S T 1 9 9 9

A U G U S TSunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday

1 2 3 4 5 6 7

8 9 10 11 13 14

15 16 17 20 21

22 23 27 28

12

29 30 31

24 25

18 19

26

Civic Holiday(Canada)Bank Holiday(Ireland & Scotland)

Summer BankHoliday (UK exceptScotland)

Liberation Day(Korea)

For hundreds of years, humankind has been excavating metals from the Earth from deposits that were originally

formed on the seafloor. Owing to the titanic forces which exhumed these deposits from the seafloor and emplaced

them on land (plate tectonics), which alter and dismember the deposits, we have not been able to understand the fun-

damentals of how the mineral-rich formations grow and evolve. Since the late 1970s, we have discovered that four

of these types of mineral deposits have actively-forming analogues in the worlds ocean basins, of which two have

been drilled during the Ocean Drilling Program. Legs 139 and 169 sampled seafloor massive sulfide deposits formed

at a sediment-covered spreading ridge. Here, the interaction between superheated seawater (heated by subseafloor

molten rock) and the volcanic and sedimentary ocean crust has resulted in the deposition of several million tons of

copper- and zinc-rich sulfide minerals. By sampling these suboceanic deposits, we are learning more about how min-

eralization occurs, how the metals migrate from one part of the deposit to another, and the location of potential addi-

tional targets for future sampling both at sea and on land.

A. Location map showing the tectonic setting of the

areas sampled by ODP Legs 139 and 169 (Middle Valley

and Enscanba Trough, off the western coast of North

America).

B. This is a cartoon of a north-

south trending cross section of

the Bent Hill Massive Sulfide

(BHMS) deposit and ODP Mound

deposit. The red color represents massive sulfide, the

olive green represents the feeder zones to these

deposits, and the yellow band represents a deep, cop-

per-rich horizon.

C. Schematic stratigraphic section

for Hole 856H in the BHMS (red

shades = massive sulfide, hatched yellow = feeder zone,

yellow band = deep copper zone, green = sediment,

purple = basalt).

D. Photograph of a core of massive, vuggy pyrite and

pyrrhotite.

E. Photograph of a core with massive sulfide veins from

a feeder zone.

F. Bedding parallel and crosscutting veins of pyrite and

pyrrhotite.

G. Subhorizontal veins of copper-rich sulfide from the

deep copper zone.

H. Photomicrograph of lamellar intergrowth of copper-

rich minerals chalcopyrite (gray) and isocubanite (yel-

low).

I. Schematic stratigraphic section for Hole 1035H in the

ODP Mound (red shades = massive sulfide, hatched yel-

low = feeder zones, yellow band = deep copper zone,

green = sediment).

J. Photograph of a core of zinc-rich (sphalerite) massive

sulfide that also contains pyrite and chalcopyrite.

K. Photomicrograph of sphalerite (dark gray) and pyrite

(light gray).

BENT HILLSULFIDE MOUNDNORTH

SOUTH

ODP SULFIDEMOUND

50 meters

50 m

eter

s

Sulfidefeeder zone

Deep Copper Zone

Basaltic Flows

Basaltic Sill Complex

Massivesulfide zoneInterpreted

856H856C856B1035C

1035F

1035E0

100

200

300

400

500m

1035H

Turbiditic hemipelagicsediment

ClasticSulfides

mbsf

52°N

48°

44°

40°

130°W 126° 122°

NORTH

Gorda

JuanFucaRidge

MiddleValley

58 m m/yr

SovancoFracture

Zone

QueenCharlotteFault

Cascadia

Subduction

Zone

SanAndreasFault

Blanco

Zone

AMERICA

GRAPHIC LOG ( 856H)

0

100

200

300

400

500

GRAPHIC LOG (1035H)

0

50

100

150

200

245

A B

CED

FG

H K

Imbsf mbsf

J

ExplorerRidge

FractureZone

EscanabaTrough

Mendocino Fracture

Ridge

and

?

?? ?Fault de

Hydro-thermal

Circulation and

deposition of metallic

sulfides

Hydro-thermal

Circulation and

deposition of metallic

sulfides

Source: ODP, Volume 169

30S E P T E M B E R 1 9 9 9Climate ResearchClimate Research

The Ocean Drilling Program is accumulating vast amounts of information with a goal to understand, predict, assess

and characterize Earth’s climate history. ODP is observing and monitoring global climate change, with the objective

of ensuring the availability of a long-term, high-quality observational record of the state of the Earth system, its nat-

ural variability, and changes that are occurring over extended time scales.

ODP research in the Santa Barbara Basin (Leg 146) demonstrates rapid surface temperature fluctuations in intervals

as short as 50 to 70 years. Studies in “icehouse” and “greenhouse” conditions have produced evidence that an

active biosphere might stabilize climate by regulating carbon dioxide by absorbing it when atmospheric and oceanic

levels were high, and releasing it when they were low. And links made between the sedimentary and orbital cycles

demonstrate Earth’s ancient climate was sensitive to small changes in incoming solar radiation.

This research is improving the description and fundamental understanding of the geological, chemical and biologi-

cal processes that affect and are affected by natural climate variability and change.

S E P T E M B E RSunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday

1 2 3 4

5 6 7 8 10 11

12 13 14 17 18

19 20 24 25

9

26 27 28 29 30

21 22

15 16

23Yom Kippur

Rosh HashanahLabor Day (USA &Canada)

Respect for the AgedDay (Japan)

Orbital Tuning Recent dating has validated changes made to thePliocene and Pleistocene portions of the GeomagneticPolarity Time Scale by orbital tuning methods. Becauseorbital cycles mark off time in geologically short incre-ments, they may be used to measure elapsed timebetween events such as magnetic reversals or biostrati-graphic datums very precisely.

Isotope data Statistical analyses of microfossil isotope data revealthe changing strengths of climate and biophererhythms over the past 4.5 m.y. Warmer colors indicatestronger cycles, with larger amplitudes.

35mm Slide tobe scanned

Source:

Source:

Source: ODP

Site 1104Site 1106

Hole 1105AHole 735B

30O C T O B E R 1 9 9 9

0

20

40

60

80

100

120

140

1600 2000 4000 6000 8000 10000

Hol

e 11

05A

dep

th (m

bsf

)

Hol

e 73

5B d

epth

(mb

sf)

180

200

220

240

260

280

300

320

0 5000 10000Magnetic susceptibility (x 10-5 SI) Magnetic susceptibility (x 10-5 SI)

Hole 735B (water depth 720 mbsl)

Unit I Deformed gabbro

Unit II Olivine gabbro

0

100

200

300

400

500

Units V, VI, and VIIOxide-bearing gabbro

(mbsf)

Hole 1105A (water depth 703 mbsl)

0(mbsf)

Unit III Oxide-bearing gabbro

Unit IV Oxide gabbro

Oxide-bearing gabbro

Oxide-bearing gabbro

Oxide gabbro100

1.2 km

±10°

A. Three-dimensional shaded-relief image of theAtlantis II transform fault looking northeast. Viewshows the transform valley, transverse ridges, mediantectonic ridge and the northern ridge transform inter-section, as well as the locations of all three ODP cruis-es to the area.

B. Digital photomicrograph taken onboard the JOIDESResolution illustrating magmatic layering as changes ingrainsize. Photomicrograph represents an area of 5.5 x3.5 mm. (Layering is present in the cores at manyscales, from millimeters to meters in thickness.

C. Illustrated here is a comparison of magnetic datafrom the cores samples at Holes 735B and 1105A. Bymatching the peaks and valley in these data, and bycomparing other types of data with the same rigor, wecan attempt to correlate intervals representing largerscale features in the ocean crust.

D. Preliminary studies indicate the high magnetic sus-ceptibility interval may be continuous between the twolocations we have sampled. Current research is com-bining the detailed core descriptions and superb log-ging data to attempt the first core-core, log-log, andcore log correlations ever in rocks sampled from thelower oceanic crust.

B.

C.

D.

O C T O B E RSunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday

1 2

3 4 5 6 8 9

10 11 12 15 16

17 18 22 23

7

24 25 26 27 28 29 30

19 20

13 14

21

Columbus Day(Observed)Thanksgiving Day(Canada)

31Halloween

Unity Day (Germany)

Republic Day(Portugal)

Health and SportsDay (Japan)National Day(Chinese Taipei)

National Day(Spain)

Bank Holiday(Ireland)

United Nations Day (USA)

Daylight Saving Time ends (USA)

People’s Republic ofChina’s Birthday(P. R of China)

National Day(Turkey)

Oceanic plates along of the mid-ocean ridge system move away from each other at very different rates

leading to a classification of fast-spreading vs. slow-spreading mid-ocean ridges. Owing to the complex plate

interactions at spreading ridges, particularly at slower spreading centers, the roots of the oceanic crust are commonly

uplifted and exposed on the ocean floor. Truly deep drilling into the seafloor awaits future technological improvements, but in

the meantime, we can take advantage of these tectonically created “windows” to sample the lower ocean crust. Also exposed in

these “windows” are rocks representing the underlying mantle. It is from these mantle rocks that molten magma was extracted, which later

crystallized to form the foundation of the ocean crust (called gabbro) or erupted on the seafloor as basaltic lava. The foundation of the lower

crust (the gabbro layers) is exposed at the seafloor along the Atlantis II Fracture Zone, on the Southwest Indian Ridge. Three Ocean Drilling Program

expeditions (Legs 118, 176 and 179) have drilled into this lower crust with some remarkable results.

Hole 735B was drilled to a depth of more than 1,500 m into gabbroic rock ODP has also drilled a companion hole (Hole 1105A) about a mile away to look at the lateral vari-

ability in the composition and structure of this large gabbro body. Both locations resulted in nearly complete recovery, a first for hard-rock drilling on the seafloor. By combining

detailed core descriptions withthe excellent downhole logging data acquired at both sites (another first for gabbroic rock exposed on the seafloor), researchers have their first opportu-

nity to attempt correlations which will help define the geometry of the subseafloor magma chambers. It is also in locations like this where scientists have the best opportunity to drill

through the gabbro section and into the mantle, one of the most longstanding goals of scientific ocean drilling.

A.Plutonic Foundation

of theOceanic

Crust

Plutonic Foundation

of theOceanic

Crust

Lowest

Highest

All sources: ODP

30N O V E M B E R 1 9 9 9

CORKS

DSDP developed re-entry cones, giving scientists the ability to drill deeper holes with multiple entries. During

ODP, a new tool was developed to establish natural laboratories for long-term observatory experiments. In 1986,

Earl Davis (Pacific Geoscience Center, Geological Survey of Canada), Keir Becker (University of Miami), Tom

Pettigrew (ODP/TAMU), and Bobb Carson (Lehigh University) designed a hydrologic seal and downhole observato-

ry for deep-ocean boreholes called the CORK system.

This unique tool monitors the formation temperatures and pressures for up to two years during and following the

recovery of deep-ocean sediments. Data recovery and fluid sampling is done via submersible or remotely operated

vehicle. There are currently 13 CORKs installed in re-entry holes, three in the Atlantic Ocean and 10 in the Pacific

Ocean. CORKs deployed in the sediment-filled Middle Valley rift of the northern Juan de Fuca Ridge provide

hydrological data on fluid flow along the rift. Fluid circulation within the sedimentary and volcanic layers of the

oceanic crust and through the seafloor has been recognized to be important in many environments, including pas-

sive continental margins, accretionary prisms, mid-ocean ridges, and ridge flanks.

N O V E M B E RSunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday

1 2 3 4 5 6

7 8 9 10 12 13

14 15 16 19 20

21 22 26 27

11

28 29 30

23 24

17 18

25

Veterans Day (USA)Remembrance Day(Canada)/Armistice1918 (France)

Thanksgiving Day(USA)

All Saints’ Day Culture Day (Japan)

Labor ThanksgivingDay (Japan)

St. Andrews Day(Scotland)

Independence Day(Finland)

King’s Birthday(Belgium)

Free Fall Funnel

The Free Fall Funnel (or mini cone) is a temporary re-

entry cone. It is split into two halves to allow installa-

tion around the suspended drill string. The assembled

cone is released to fall freely down the drill pipe to the

seafloor before the bit is pulled clear of the hole pro-

viding a means to re-enter the hole once the drill bit is

changed. The Free Fall Funnel has saved ODP mil-

lions of dollars in operation costs because it is 15

times less expensive than the re-entry cone platform.

Vibration Isolated Television

The Vibration Isolated Television frame is primarily

used to provide visual observation of the sea floor dur-

ing re-entry of an existing borehole. The sonar, in con-

junction with a compass attached to the VIT frame,

provides primary range and bearing from the VIT frame

to the reentry cone. An acoustic beacon can be

attached allowing the JOIDES Resolution’s dynamic

positioning system computers to fix the position of the

VIT frame relative to the ship.

AdvancementsFree Fall Photo

TV Camers Photo

ODPTechnological

Logging While DrillingSeismic Section: Examples of LWD density logs through the Barbados Accretionary prism penetratingthrough the plate-bounding decollement fault. (After ODP Leg 156 Shipboard Scientific Party, Eos,1995). With LWD, formation properties are recorded immediately after drilling before borehole con-ditions deteriorate in response to drilling and coring operations.

(LWD) Logging-While-Drilling operations use drill collars packed with electronics that are screwed into thestring of drill pipe near the bit. After LWD is completed,engineers download data from the drill collarsfor analysis and interpretation.

AdvancementsSource: Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution

Source: LDEO

Source: LDEO

Source: ODP

Source: ODP

Source: ODP

30D E C E M B E R 1 9 9 9

D E C E M B E RSunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday

1 2 3 4

5 6 7 8 10 11

12 13 14 17 18

19 20 24 25

9

26 27 28 29 30 31

21 22

15 16

23 Christmas Day

Boxing Day(Australia, CanadaNew Zealand & UK)St. Stephen’s Day(Ireland)

First Day ofHanukkah

Independence Day(Portugal)

ImmaculateConception (Italy,Spain & Portugal)

New Year’s Eve

St. Nicholas Day(Germany &Netherlands)

113

104

119120

105

151

114

162

178

Arctic & Antarctic Legs

Leg 104 -- Paleoenvironments of the Norwegian SeaLeg 105 -- Baffin Bay and Labrador SeaLeg 113 -- Weddel Sea, AntarcticaLeg 114 -- Subantarctic, South AtlanticLeg 119 -- Prydz Bay, East AntarcticaLeg 120 -- Kerguelen PlateauLeg 151 -- Arctic Gateways ILeg 162 -- Arctic Gateways IILeg 178 -- Antarctic Glacial History and Sea-Level Change

ODP has dedicated nine expeditions in Arctic andAntarctic waters to interpret past ice conditions...

HIGH-LATITUDERESEARCH

by theOcean Drilling Program

HIGH-LATITUDERESEARCH

by theOcean Drilling Program

Just 15,000 years ago permanent ice covered large por-

tions of North America, Europe and Asia, as well as the

Polar Regions. The history and causes of the Cenozoic

ice ages have long intrigued geologists and climatolo-

gists, however until recently scientists had only a frag-

mentary understanding of the onset and history of

glaciation in both northern and southern hemispheres.

Evidence from the marine sedimentary record sampled

by ocean drilling indicates that the major development

of Northern Hemisphere glaciation occurred about 2.7

million years ago, although the evidence also shows

that glaciers existed in the Norwegian-Greenland Sea

region as early as 12 million years ago. By contrast,

drilling has shown that cryospheric development in

Antarctica preceded that in the Northern Hemisphere

by at least 30 million years.

The processes associated with glaciation also differ

between northern and southern hemispheres. Northern

Hemisphere glaciation is associated with an abun-

dance of meltwater, high precipitation and no perma-

nent ground ice. Sediments undergo significant chemi-

cal weathering and are reworked by the action of glac-

iers and rivers. By contrast, the dominant processes in

the Antarctic are mechanical, with grounded ice sheets

and deposition occurring under the floating edges of

the ice sheets or in the open marine setting in front of

the ice.

Study of the diversity of these modern glacially influ-

enced environments, along with information provided

by marine sediment cores from adjacent waters, allows

for continued refinement of our interpretation of past

ice conditions in the Earth’s high latitude regions, and

of the causes and consequences of climatic change, at

increasingly higher resolution.

Rock debris, such as coarse sand and gravel, can be

transported into the marine environment by floating

ice, referred to as ice-rafting. When the ice melts, the

entrained debris load is released into the water column

where it rapidly settles to the bottom. In deep marine

environments where sedimentation typically consists of

very fine-grained material, the coarse debris settles into

soft mud or ooze on the seafloor.

Leg 104: Norwegian SeaHole 644A - Pleistocene

Leg 119: Prydz BayHole 741A - HoloceneHole 742A - Lower Pliocene