Ostashkov Glaciation

(also late Valdai glaciation), the last glaciation of the Eastern European Plain; it ended about 10,000 years ago. During the Ostashkov glaciation the continental glacier reached the present-day Valdai Hills. The name of the glaciation was proposed by the Soviet geologist A. I. Moskvitin in 1938. Some geologists, including Moskvitin, consider the Ostashkov glaciation the second glaciation of the Late Pleistocene. They believe that it was separated from the first glaciation, the Kalinin glaciation, by the warm Mologo-Sheksna interglacial period. Other scientists consider the Ostashkov glaciation part of a single and longer Late Pleistocene Valdai glaciation. (See alsoANTHROPOGENIC SYSTEM [PERIOD].)