The Arctic Detachment of the Karpinsky Institute sums up the field work results

In the 2024 field season, the Arctic Detachment of the Karpinsky Institute conducted joint expeditionary work with the Northern Fleet of the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation and the Russian Geographical Society.

The work was carried out under the theme “Monitoring of the State Geological Map at 1:1,000,000 scale of the Russian Federation and its continental shelf in 2023-2025.”

The work area covered the Novaya Zemlya archipelago (Severny Island). Ground-based geological studies were performed to clarify the geological structure of the poorly studied and previously unexplored areas of the north Kara-Barents Sea and south Kara-Barents Sea legends of the State Geological Map-1000/3 sheet series (Novaya Zemlya).

During the work period, a geological study of key outcrops was conducted, and sedimentary rocks of the Devonian, Carboniferous, and Permian were collected.

Documentation and sampling were completed for comprehensive laboratory and analytical studies of the Upper Proterozoic Makovsky strata metamorphic rocks (Mak Bay).

Another important component of the field investigations performed was sampling of the Devonian and Mesozoic(?) igneous formations from the bedrock outcrops.

Laboratory and analytical studies of the sampled rock material are based on classical as well as new precision methods that have proven themselves well but have not previously been used when studying the stratigraphic and geochemical features of the area.

According to Anton Shmanyak, Leading Geologist of the Department of Lithogeodynamics and Metallogeny of Sedimentary Basins, who participated in the expedition: “Definitely, the new results will both complement the existing geological information of the region and clarify the north Kara-Barents Sea legend of the State Geological Map-1000/3 sheet series. New geological information will also be obtained on the western sector of the Arctic zone of the Russian Federation and the geological history not only of the land part of Novaya Zemlya, but the Barents-Kara region as a whole.”

And very soon we will release a short video about the field work of the Arctic Detachment. Follow our news!

P.S. The material uses original photographs of expedition members Vitaly Novikov, Leonid Kruglov, Anton Shmanyak.