Holocene glaciations in the Ema Glacier valley, Monte Sarmiento Massif, Tierra del Fuego

Abstract

Investigations carried out in the Ema Glacier valley, Tierra del Fuego, on the eastern side of Monte Sarmiento Massif, enable the recognition of five Holocene glacial events. The oldest glacial advance deposited the so-called external moraines of Ema Glacier, with a probable occurrence between 6000 and 5000 14 C y BP without discarding the potential for these deposits to be from Lateglacial time. The remaining four readvances built up a complex inner moraine system named informally internal moraines of Ema Glacier. The oldest recognized till unit that constitutes this proximal moraine system was deposited shortly before 3135 14 C y BP, when glaciolacustrine sedimentation took place during glacier recession. Subsequent glacial advances accumulated till at about 1288 14 C y, shortly after 695 14 C y, and between 379 14 C y and 60 y BP. This chronology of Holocene glacier events coincides with and is well complemented by the one established by other authors for Fiordo Pía at Cordillera Darwin, 75 km to the east. The Ema-Pía chronology is used to calibrate tentatively a series of moraine belts previously identified in the mountain ranges adjacent to Ushuaia, 150 km SE of the surveyed region. A comparative chart shows that the chronological data obtained for the neoglacial readvances in Tierra del Fuego are in accordance with those for the southern Patagonian Andes further north. It follows that the Holocene behavior of the glaciers in the Andean region of Tierra del Fuego and southern Patagonia is essentially a response to the same regional climate change.