On the Great Barrier Reef shelf, terrigenous sediments adjacent to the Herb
ert River delta are strongly partitioned within the coastal zone, in common
with the regional presence of a terrigenous inner-shelf sediment wedge. Pa
rtitioning is primarily controlled by wind-driven currents and waves associ
ated with persistent southeast trade winds. Bottom-return currents provide
the likely mechanism for episodic transport of fine-grained sediment in an
offshore direction, although modelled bottom-return currents appear incapab
le of transporting much sediment seawards beyond the 20 m isobath. This dep
th corresponds to the observed outer limit of the nearshore sediment wedge.