Multibeam and seismic data acquired during the ERGAP 1 and ERGAP 2 allowed the recognition and study of three big depressions which are located in the continental slope southeast of the Galicia Bank. These depressions correspond to collapses circular in shape that reach 370 m depth and whose size range between 2000 y 5000 m. Among them the so called BURATO ERGAP have been analysed in detail. Seismic records from this depression indicate its erosive character, the occurrence of a diapir underneath related to a shale layer, numerous faults that extend from the seafloor to the shale layer at both sides of the depression and finally and transparent seismic facies that could be associated to fluid venting. The genesis of this collapses must be explain in the framework of the Cenozoic Pyrenean compressive events, where faulting of the sedimentary cover over a viscous shale layer among other factors can be invoked to explain this outstanding features

El objeto del presente trabajo es el estudio de los colapsos gigantes presentes en la región del Banco de Galicia a partir de la estructura de la que se tiene una documentación más completa: el colapso que hemos denominado “BURATO ERGAP”. Hasta el momento se han descrito colapsos de grandes dimensiones en otras zonas del Margen Ibérico Atlántico como en el Golfo de Cádiz

Este trabajo ha sido desarrollado mediante los proyectos de investigación ERGAP (VEM 2003-20093-CO3) y CONTOURIBER (CTM2008-06399-C04/MAR), contribuyendo una contribución al proyecto TOPOIBERIA (Consolider-Ingenio 2010, CSD2006-0041)

6º Simposio sobre el Margen Ibérico Atlántico (MIA09), 1-5 de diciembre 2009, Oviedo