Fig. 2: Stratigraphy and chronology of the abandoned paleochannel.
From: Cascading hazards of a major Bengal basin earthquake and abrupt avulsion of the Ganges River
a Hand and tube-well coring of the paleochannel revealed a typical meandering-channel bed profile with a thalweg depth of ~20 m below the surface. The channel was only partially infilled with fine muds, atypical for abandoned channels of the mainstem Ganges River. Channel-sand ages yield a weighted mean of 2.61 ± 0.11 ka, and the infilling muds luminescence dated to 2.48 ± 0.14 ka. b View from the pointbar of the paleochannel, looking across to the outer bank, shows the scale of the feature. c Comparison of cross-sectional areas of the modern mainstem Ganges River at Hardinge Bridge, the modern Gorai distributary (a secondary offtake), and this paleochannel supports interpretation of this feature as a former mainstem Ganges channel. Note that the different morphology for the modern and paleo cross-sectional profiles simply reflect their differing locations along straight and meandering channel reaches, respectively.
