The Tampen slide is the penultimate megaslide on the mid-Norwegian margin, and is purported to have occurred 120-130,000 years ago. The recently collected AMS17 3D seismic data (acquired by TGS) encompasses the full headwall of the Tampen slide, and reveals the internal deformation of the slide in an unprecedented level of detail. Analysis of the AMS17 data enables us to constrain the failure mechanism of the Tampen slide, and also to understand more about the kinematics of the failure.
At least four megaslides have occurred on mid-Norwegian margin over the last 500,000 years. The most recent of these - the Storegga slide that occurred 8,200 years ago - has been extensively studied due to the co-location of its headwall region with the Ormen Lange Gas Field; however, significantly less is known about the other megaslides in the region. Their lateral extent, volume, emplacement mechanism, and basal plane characteristics remain poorly defined. Constraining these parameters for the mid-Norwegian megaslides that predate Storegga is important, because it will allow us to better understand the similarities and differences in the way these slides occurred - information that enables a better understanding of the hazard posed by such slides, and the properties of the sediments.
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