The SEZAM (SEdimentation des apports du ZAMbèze) campaign focuses on the central area of the Mozambique Channel, around the Eparses Islands, in order to acquire the data needed to understand the feeding of the deep basin by continental sediments from the Zambezi River and carbonate sediments produced by the isolated carbonate platforms (Europa and Bassas da India). The project has three major objectives: (1) to determine the chronology of sediment deposition from the Zambezi River into the basin in relation to paleoclimatic and paleoenvironmental variations, (2) to clarify the role of bottom currents on sediment distribution, and (3) to determine the role of vertical motions (variations in sea level and tectonics) in sediment organisation in the basin.

The campaign used geophysical tools at 8-10 knots (multibeam sounder, Rapid airgun multitrace seismic, Sub-Bottom Profiler, ADCP) to define the sedimentary and structural architectures of the deep basin around the Eparses Islands. Calypso coring (15 to 50 m) was carried out to sample the different depositional environments, and specify the age and nature of the sediments. The chronostratigraphic framework will enable us to deduce the feeding periods of the deep submarine delta as a function of variations in sea level and climatic evolution over the last 100s of thousands of years, as well as deformations linked to tectonic reactivations.