1 The perception in California along that coast is that those 



2 canyons are pretty actively picking up the long-shore transport of 



3 particulates as they conduit down off the slope, but here, you are not 



4 saying that. Is that what I have heard in the discussion here? 



5 Are the canyons or are not the canyons, in your mind, a major 

 5 conduit of material off onto the slopes? 



7 DR. BUTMAN: I think all I am addressing here is this, that stuff 



8 comes in and is going like this (indicating), but we have not addressed 



9 what comes out. 



10 You are saying that in addition to being a vacuum cleaner from the 



11 shelf, that they also--stuff accumulates and may move out into the 



12 deeper water in some other mechanism. I think that we really don't have 



13 much data. 



14 We really haven't addressed the issue of what happens to the-- 



15 DR. RAY: I was asking it as a question. I wasn't stating it 



16 either way. I was just trying to get a clarification because, you know, 



17 John raised a point there and it was still hanging. I wasn't sure 



18 whether we had really defined, you know, the active role of these 



19 canyons as far as transporting stuff off the shelf. 



20 What you are saying is we really don't know; is that what you are 



21 saying? 



22 DR. BUTMAN: I'm saying we haven't addressed it yet this morning, 



23 yes. 



24 DR. RAY: Okay. 



25 DR. AYERS: If we do choose to address it, you know, why 



26 wouldn't — logically, you would think if they were conduits, I mean, why 



27 wouldn't they fill up over time if they were? You know, they've been 



28 there for eons and sediment has been going into them and yet, they are 



29 not full. 



30 DR. TEAL: I had that problem yesterday, too. The geologists 



31 don't seem to have a very good idea of how fast stuff is accumulating 



32 and not accumulating. I still, I guess, see them probably as a conduit 



33 to deeper water. It isn't clear to me from what we saw in the data 



34 yesterday that you can support that idea. 



190 



