Lenses of massive ground ice and cryopegs were found at different levels in Holocene deposits in the northeastern Yamal Peninsula. Massive ice, 7 to 9 m thick, occurs at the depth 12 m under the Seyakha (Mutnaya) River. Multistage massive ground ice (four lenses, 0.4 m thick and 8 m long) exists in Gyda terrace I. Cl⁻/SO4⁻² ratios, spore-pollen spectra, and the presence of algae have implications for the origin of the Sabettayakha massive ice of different types. Columnar brown ice formed by freezing of sand saturated with water of the Ob Gulf, monolith brown ice is a frozen lake talik, while ultra-fresh white ice originates from lake and stream waters. Massive ground ice occurs in pre-Quaternary consolidated deposits, as well as in Holocene and modern sediments.

Anion concentrations in the ice were measured immediately after the ice melted, in the Chemical-Analytical Centre of the Geographical Department of Lomonosov Moscow State University by ion chromatography "Stayer" with a conductivity detector.